Glad You Came
by Papery
Summary: Lal had known Colonnello for years, and her dislike of him had never changed. Colonnello had given up on his desperate hope that he hated Lal years ago. And now Reborn, Luce, Yuni, Skull, Viper and even Verde will stop at nothing to change Lal's mind.
1. Fool Me Once, Shame On Me

**A/N: Welp. Here I am. writing AU High School fics because the god damn plot bunnies don't go away. It took me three days to write nearly 30 pages of this thing, and I don't know how close to being done I am. Please don't hate me for the cliche high schooliness. **  
**And of course, have to Lalonnello, because I've been watching Reborn lately and dear _god_ am I obsessed. Not with just the show, but with the pairing. I also happen to be an avie Reborn/Luce shipper but we can get to that another day.**

**So, this chapter is short, but I promise there's more (if you're a fan of the story, that is) and I'll be updating a few times a week if I can get to editing the chapters.**

**Also feel free to point out any errors in spelling (especially the names because they're spelled so many ways all over the place that it's hard to decide what's right.) and grammar and such. Or if anything sounds awkward!**

**Reviews are my best friend, even if it's just to say that you like the story. Criticism and welcomed oh-so-much as well!**

**Excuse OOCness, as well. I'll just say that they _are_ teens and thus act a little bit different than they would as adults in the anime. That's my excuse!**

**And now I will shut up so you can read. Enjoy~!**

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Blackness. Darkness. Nothing. It was warm…comfortably warm.

'_No point in getting up now…_' Lal thought lazily. A smile formed on her lips and she curled up into a tight ball under the covers of her bed, ready to drift back into sleep.

But when is being a teenager ever that easy? Lal's multiple alarms blared near and far from her warm cocoon all at once, shocking the girl into wakefulness and coaxing several curses from her mouth.

"LA-AL! Get u-up!" Called her mother, pulling forth more curses as Lal sat up and rubbed sleep from her eyes. She sat at the edge of her bed, legs dangling and back hunched as she continued to blink sleep out of her eyes. After a few minutes of idleness she slid off her bed and stumbled clumsily toward the bathroom to get ready for the day.

'_Friday_.' Her thoughts were muddled but that brought another smile and she went more or less cheerfully about her morning ritual. Once everything in the bathroom had been accomplished, she stripped out of her pajamas and rooted through her closet for something to wear for school that day. In the end, she decided to go the comfortable route and pulled on a pair of sweatpants and a simple, matching t-shirt.

"Ahh…just what I need to suffer through one more day of school." Lal muttered to herself while gathering the few binders and notebooks that she needed for the day. She shoved them noncommittally into her backpack while simultaneously looking for her wallet and keys. Only one more week of school and then she was done – the privileges of being a senior.

"Lal, dear, do you want me to make you breakfast?" Her mother asked while lal scrambled around downstairs in search of her phone.

"What? Oh. Oh yeah. Um. Sure, mom." She replied distractedly. She ran quickly back up to her room and tore apart her desk and bed before glancing at her clock and seeing it plugged in and charging. Of course.

"Christ, I need to go to bed earlier…" She muttered as she pulled it free and shoved it into the pocket of her sweatpants.

"Lal, hon, you've got to go, or you'll be late!" Lal's mother called up the stairs while shaking the paper bag that held Lal's breakfast. The girl ran down the stairs and snatched the bag from her mother's hand, calling out a hurried "Bye!" before picking up her bag and keys and running out to her car.

"Late, late, late…" She hissed under her breath, putting her foot to the floor and speeding the entire way to school.

"Laaate, fuck, I'm late." Lal growled, pulling into the student parking lot and running from the car to the building that held her locker. When she got there, her run slowed to a jog and then a walk, finally she stopped, several feet away from her destination.

Standing in front of her locker, having an animated conversation was a blonde boy and the crazy-haired, suit-wearing Reborn. It took Lal a moment to recognize the guy waving his arms around like a maniac, but the moment she did, she got a dangerous look on her face and walked with determined steps over to her locker.

Reborn looked up when he noticed someone approaching him and his friend. It took him only a moment to realize who it was. The look of surprise on his face made the blonde boy lower his arms and cock his head in confusion.

"What is it, Spiffy?" He asked, while Lal stood with her arms crossed and her scary looking scowl still in place.

"Er. You may want to leave now, Colonnello." Reborn replied, putting his hands in his pockets and pulling his lips up into a smirk.

"Eh?" Colonnello caught the direction of Reborn's gaze and turned around. He looked down at the frowning girl in front of him and smiled, "Well _hey_ there, Lal!" His face was the epitome of relaxation and ease, but Reborn could tell from how tense the rest of him was that he didn't like being this close to the much smaller girl.

"You're in front of my _locker_, Zipperhead." She said through gritted teeth. Colonnello looked somewhat taken aback by the insult, while Reborn simply cracked a bigger smile and allowed a chuckle.

Lal stood there, arms crossed, scowl firmly in place and eyes narrowed as she stared down the tall blonde in front of her. After a few seconds it was clear that Colonnello had lost his nerve and moments later his hands were up and he had backed into Reborn in his haste to run from the situation. Reborn quickly sidestepped him and caught his arm as he fell backward, helping his friend to his feet and shoving him on his way.

"Do as the lady says, if you want to keep your ass, Zipperhead!" Reborn called after him, earning two middle fingers in response. When Reborn turned back to Lal she was already finishing up with her locker and closing it to go to class.

"I've got to go to class, talk to you later, Spiff." Lal said hurriedly.

"Lal, wait." Reborn said as she turned away. Lal paused and looked at Reborn, a little confused by his hesitation.

"Reborn?" She asked, looking up at him and then down at his hand as he held something out. Once she realized what it was, Lal laughed nervously and shook her head.

"You're…kidding, right?" She asked, looking at the ticket in his hand and then up at his face. She got no answer, "Reborn. You're kidding, yeah?" She waited several seconds before prodding him with another question, "Rebooorn?"

Finally, Reborn shook his head.

"No, I'm being serious." He looked her in the eye and actually grinned, "Come on, Lal. Let me take you to senior ball. You skipped out on every single social event in favor of whatever it is you do when you're home since freshman year. I'm not going to let you miss this." Lal was shaking her head at this point. Class had been forgotten as she leaned up against her locker and stared at Reborn, carefully coming up with her well-thought-out reply.

"I'm not wearing a dress. And there's no way in hell you'll ever get me to." She stated matter of factly. Reborn's grin just grew into an infuriating smirk.

"No, no, see, you're _going_. Colonnello may be scared shitless of you, but I know how to get you to do things for me." The disgusted face Lal made at the lewd remark eased a chuckle from the hat wearing teen.

"Here, take this, Lal. Please?" Reborn pleaded with her, waving the ticket in front of her face. Lal stared at it with no expression for several seconds before she finally let loose a massive sigh and took it from his hand.

"You didn't give me much notice, you know." She muttered, but she accepted defeat. Reborn could have gotten anyone he wanted as a date for prom; instead, he'd waited until a week before to ask her. Probably because he knew she would feel horrible if she said no.

"You don't have to worry, Yuni already agreed to help you get your dress and all that girly stuff." Reborn answered.

"Yuni…already…oh you bastard." She shoved him roughly, "You're lucky I like you. You had this all planned didn't you?" Reborn's cocky grin was all she needed to see to confirm her assumption.

"Now go to class, Lal. You're late!" He turned and strode off, leaving Lal feeling way more pissed off than when she saw the army brat in front of her locker. She leaned back up against her locker and stared at the ceiling, wondering why the hell Reborn wanted to torture her so much. Once the tardy bell rang, she decided to actually make her way to class, sliding into her seat just as the teacher began calling out names for attendance.

She wouldn't be focusing at all today.


	2. Fool Me Twice, You're Screwed

**A/N: I had to wait until I caught up in the manga to post this up...and let me just say I can't wait until the next chapter comes out kasjfhadsjkfh.**

**In the meantime, I will write my fics and stay absorbed in my little world of KHR.**

**Anyway, this chapter is also short and a little icky imo. I spent most of yesterday editing it and I guess this is as good as it'll get. Just a few notes for the story as a whole, as well; zipperhead was a racial slur used during the Korean war to describe the Asians because their heads split down the middle when shot. Hence, like a zipper. So she calls him that, clearly as an insult. army brat is the kinda derogatory term for the child of two parents (or even one) who is in the army, though I'm not sure if I'm going to make that apply necessarily to 'Nello.**

**Annnd sorry for the epic OOCness of everyone. I'm still getting to know the characters fully, but I think I'm getting better now that I've caught up with the manga.**

**And with that, I leave you with a new chapter! I may even have the next one up later today, if I can sneak some laptop usage in during APUSH...**

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"Mom, I'm home." Lal called listlessly, slamming the door behind her with her foot and dropping her bag onto the floor. She made it all the way to the couch before collapsing and groaning loudly into the pillow she had stuffed into her face.

"Lal? Something wrong?" Her mother called from somewhere else in the house. Lal lifted her head and looked around for her mother, letting her face drop back into the couch pillow when she was nowhere to be found.

"Lal." Her mother said again, making her way to the couch. Lal looked up, the grin on her mother's face making the girl frown.

"Reborn asked me to prom." She muttered, returning to her facedown position. Her mother's laughter had been expected, so Lal continued to stuff her face into the not too soft pillow.

"Lal, dear, I hope you didn't say no." Lal's mother said, sitting down on the couch beside her heat and putting an arm around her daughter's shoulders to force her into a sitting position.

"No…or else I wouldn't be so mopey." Lal replied, her voice glum. "He guilted me into it. Freaking jerk."

"You should go."

Lal looked at her mother, not surprised in the least.

"I don't _want_ to." Lal whined, leaning into her mother and sighing like an upset toddler.

"Your friends are going. And it's one night that you'll remember for the rest of your life, Lal." That was a massive exaggeration, but Lal's mother knew that her daughter would eventually suck it up and go to the event. It would take much poking and prodding to get her to agree.

The acceptance came much sooner than either of the women would have thought.

"Fine, fine. I'll go. I'm doing it for _you_ though, Mom. Not that jerk." Lal's answer made her mother smile and kiss her on her forehead.

"Whatever you want, hon. Will you need help with shopping for your dress?" Lal's mother was getting up now, and she began to walk over to where she had come out from. Lal shrugged.

"I'll pay for whatever you want me to pay for. It's your one and only prom, after all." Lal's mother called, disappearing into her bedroom and leaving Lal to ponder what she had said.

"Laaaaal!" Yuri called, running toward her friend and grinning at her when they met in the hallway at school the next day. "Let's go shopping after school today! And find you a pretty dress!"

Lal froze and turned from her locker, unable to not smile at the three-years-younger girl's infectious grin.

"Hi, Yuni." Lal said, closing her locker and walking toward her first class of the day. Yuni followed after her and. Began to babble about dresses and colors and hair and shoes, while Lal let her talk and simply tuned her out most of the way. Yuni was going to go with her today so she wouldn't have to worry about picking out anything for herself. Yuni would ship out the perfect dress and they'd be done in maybe half an hour.

"So meet with me at your locker right after school, and we can take your car?" Yuni asked once they'd taken a seat in their elective class. Lal nodded absently, replying, "Yep," in a bored voice. Already she was in class mode, and ever since she'd been accepted at west point she barely put any effort into paying attention in class.

The day went by at an agonizingly slow pace, but not slow enough for Lal. She was _not_ looking forward to the little shopping trip that she would be taking with Yuni in exactly half an hour. She continually glanced at the clock, tapping her pen against the surface of her desk and crossing and uncrossing her legs every few minutes, restless and antsy.

Lal sighed and rubbed her eyes, the droning voice of the teacher making her seriously consider bashing her head into the wall behind her. She tilted her head back and looked up at the ceiling, and then took a look around the room for lack of an idea of what else she could do once she was bored with counting ceiling tiles.

Her head stopped turning when she caught the eyes of another person, staring at her with bright blue eyes. Her eyes widened for a moment until she realized who it was. And then they narrowed and her eyebrows knit together. The army brat's gaze remained the same, however. Usually he backed off, but right now he held her narrow-eyed stare with an infuriating smirk that made Lal seriously consider walking across the room to slap it off his face.

"Amelie! Faire attencion." The teacher barked, making Lal whip her head around and mutter an apology, glaring down at the French words in her open textbook. What the hell was that stupid army brat staring at?

When Lal looked back at the blonde, he'd returned to looking at the front of the room. Whether or not he was paying attention was unknown and of no concern to her. Except that it was hard for Lal not to glance back in his direction every few minutes. Once class was over, she rushed as quickly as she could from the room, expecting to some degree what would happen next.

"Lal!" The voice just made her walk faster. "Lal! Lal! Lal Mirch!" Colonnello kept repeating her name, and she could hear his heavy boots as he jogged through the hall to catch up with her. She was sure that people were watching the two as they passed, amused by their interaction as was usually the case. But Lal was determined not to have to talk to that obnoxious zipperhead, and nothing would stop her now.

"Lal!" Colonnello called once more. Lal got stuck in a crowd of people leaving from the assembly hall, and with several muttered swears she attempted to push her way through the crowd.

"Lal."

Lal felt a large hand grip her shoulder and pull her out of the flow of people. She reached up and tried to push it off, but Colonnello simply tightened his grip and turned her around.

"I have something to ask you." He said, while Lal glared daggers at him. The retard was a lot bigger than her, and that was the only reason that she was unable to get away. If it had been a few years ago, when he was a _midget_ instead of a fucking _giant_ then she would be fine. Sadly, her silence didn't deter him and he continued, despite how obvious it was she wanted nothing to do with him.

"Will you go to prom with me?"

Lal was so taken aback by the request that she simply stood in place with her mouth open. Colonnello waved a hand in front of her face after a good minute or so of silence and shocked staring.

"Lal?" He asked, looking amused by her shock after it lasted a few seconds more.

'_Did he just…seriously…ask me to…prom?_' Lal thought, her mind not really comprehending the idea. Finally, thought, she was able to come up with a response.

In the form of a knee to the crotch and a punch to the jaw.

Colonnello was on the ground with his hands clutching his nads and a groan of pain coming from his mouth.

"I'm going with Reborn, you cunt. And don't think that because you're his friend you get off easy by asking me something like that. Get bent and die." Lal had bent down to speak to the army brat, and he opened one eye to stare at her while she spoke. She didn't miss the tiny smirk he had on his lips amidst the pain, either.

"Masochist." She growled under her breath.

After she finished her little speech, Lal calmly got up and walked past the few people who had stopped to take in the scene. None stayed too long – it was nothing surprising to see Lal and Colonnello get into some sort of conflict. Colonnello was well known for purposely pissing Lal off, despite the inevitable outcome of him getting his ass severely kicked. Nobody questioned that he never fought back, like he had when they were in middle school, either.

Lal was going back to her locker, putting the littlee spat in the back of his mind. When she got there, Yuni was leaning against it and talking with Reborn. Lal managed a smile and waved at the two as she approached, opening up her locker and shoving everything into it.

"Hi, Lal! Ready to go?" Yuni asked, smiling at her. Lal took a breath and sighed, none too excited for this but nodded nonetheless. Reborn nodded a hello as well, sticking his hands in his pants pockets as he leaned like the 'cool guy' against a locker and remaining silent.

"I suppose so." Lal replied, not looking all that happy about the whole dress shopping thing. Reborn moved and put an arm around her, roughing up her hair with a smirk and getting a few weak smacks from the shorter girl in response.

"Oi, let me go!" She commanded, putting her somewhat messy hair back into its place when Reborn stepped away and continued to lean against the lockers.

"You better not be difficult, Lal. Yuni doesn't deserve your stubbornness." Lal made a face and rolled her eyes at Reborn, telling him to scram so she could leave with Yuni.

"Oh, by the way," Lal called. Reborn stopped and looked over his shoulder, "the army brat may need his dick replaced." She finished dismissively as she walked away with Yuni. Reborn made a face and shook his head as he walked off.

"I told you to leave it up to me, Colonnello…"


	3. The Shopping Gene

**A/N: Here's chapter threeeeee. I don't have too much to say about this one...I tried to put in a tiny bit of background on some of the Arcobaleno, edited this one a bit, and now it's all ready for you guys to reaaaad!**

**Once again. Reviews would make me happy :) And I appreciate each and every one of them!**

**I don't have much else to say about this chapter, so read on and enjoy!**

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"Y-yuni, is it really this difficult to pick out a dress? We've been here for three hours…" Lal was getting tired of trying on dresses. In fact, she was quite simply tired in general.

"But we haven't found you the perfect dress yet. There's one more store I want to look at with you, and then we can choose from the dresses I held!" Yuni replied cheerfully, as if her friend hadn't been putting on and taking off dress after dress for the past three hours.

'_Why did the 'love of shopping' gene have to skip me…?'_ Lal thought, annoyed. It would have come in handy right now.

They walked into the last store, and Lal took it in. There were so many dresses that she thought she might have to vomit.

"That's a little extreme, Lalu." Yuni said with a smile. Lal scrunched up her nose at the pet name, but muttered that she hadn't meant to say that aloud. Yuni just laughed.

"Okay, let's get going, we've got a lot to look through!" Yuni grabbed Lal's hand and dragged her off to the section that held dresses her size.

'_Oh god, save me…_'

"No, not this one…not this one…this one's gross…not this…nope…no…oh hell no…" Yuni muttered to herself as she sorted through all the dresses that they had picked out in the store. There was a messy pile of already worn ones that Yuni was sorting through, and two left that Lal had to try on.

"Lalu, try those ones on while I put these ones away." Yuni said, while picking up all the discarded dresses and then leaving the dressing room. Lal sighed and did as she was told, looking at a deep blue dress that nearly exactly matched the blue-black shade of her hair. As Lal held it up, she saw that it had lacing that wrapped from the front of her right thigh all the way around her stomach and left side and up to the middle of her back. There was a slit that started just below where the lacing ended, that looked like it would bare a hefty amount of her leg.

"Well, that's a no." She said cheerfully. "Too much skin." Lal moved onto the next dress, that was a simple and light blue dress that zipped up to slightly above the middle of her back. It was long and had a skirt that was ruffled the whole way down. She didn't dislike it, but it wasn't one of her favorites. Not that she liked dresses or anything.

She slipped into the dress just as Yuni returned, stepping into the dressing room and taking in the dress that Lal had on. She studied it for a few seconds before shaking her head and stating a simple, "Nope!" Lal stared at her for a few seconds.

"Wh…what?" Lal said, crossing her arms and frowning at her friend.

"It's no good. Try that one on! Then if it's not the one we can go back to the other stores and pick the best dress from those." Yuni said matter-of-factly. Lal stood still for several seconds, starting to shake her head, until she caught the look Yuni had on her face. It was one that the girl had perfected just as her sister had – this damned pleading look that made it nearly impossible for anyone to say no. It was those big eyes they had that helped pull it off, and Lal cursed them with every fiber of her being right now.

Lal finally gave up with a huge and unnecessary sigh, stripping out of the dress she was in. She requested help from Yuni to put the other one on, and took as long as she could to do so.

She didn't even bother looking at herself in the mirror once it was on – she knew that it wasn't to her liking. Yuni studied her for only a few seconds before smiling and nodding, much to Lal's dismay.

"That's the one!" She stated decisively. Lal began to shake her head, but Yuni held up her hand.

"You don't have any idea about fashion, Lalu. Like I said earlier, leave this all up to me." Yuni said. "Now change back into your other clothes and we'll buy this. I already know the shoes we'll get, and I saw some other things that will go with it as well…" Yuni continued to talk about the items she was going to buy while Lal tuned her out, changing back into her much more comfortable clothes and thinking about how much of a pain it was that Reborn had asked her to do this.

'_If it had been anyone else..._' she closed her eyes and sighed. He used their friendship as a weapon sometimes, that crazy suit wearing mafia kid. It was a known fact that his parents were a part of one of the largest organized-crime groups in the city, but he didn't use it as a weapon. He was scary enough on his own, not to mention the fact he had a _weapon_ with him every day. Lal was convinced that Reborn was actually clinically insane at times.

And then there was Colonnello. The kid was so adamant about being in the army that he had already gone through his basic training the summer before their senior year. He was infuriating and found amusement in pissing her off whenever the chance arose. He also didn't seem to care about getting his ass whipped by her several times a week.

The only reason she didn't hurt him more severely was because Reborn asked her not to. The damn suit wearing asshole was Colonnello's best friend (they may as well be brothers, the way they fought over everything all the time) and he, for some reason, didn't see the value in chopping the army brat's genitals off.

"Lal! Let's go check out now!" Yuni snapped Lal out of her thoughts and she nodded glumly, gathering the dress and leaving the room.

The rest of their trip went by in a blur and before she knew it Lal had dropped Yuni off at school to find her sister, Luce and she was home, actually taking a look at the things that Yuni had picked out for her.

"Oh, Lal, these are wonderful!" her mother gushed as she looked at the shoes and jewelry. The shoes were made of a similar satiny material that the dress was, and they were impossibly tall. So she wouldn't have to crane her neck to see Reborn's face, Yuni had said.

'_Reborn isn't that tall...'_ Lal thought bitterly. She didn't like shots at her small stature in comparison to all the boys, but in all honesty she didn't want to wear the shoes. She couldn't deny that they were pretty, with an open toe and the small bow on the top of the toe part, but just the thought of wearing the six-inch heels made her feet hurt.

The necklace was a web of chains and silvery rhinestones that laid across her collarbones, and the earrings were three chains that barely brushed her shoulders and ended in the same silvery rhinestones as the necklace.

"Yuni is such a sweetheart, getting all this picked out for you. Tell her she should do your hair as well!" Lal's mother brought her from her thoughts, and she smiled.

"She's already told me I have no choice and that she's going to be getting me ready this weekend." Lal informed her mother. "And she also says hello."

Lal's mother smiled and repeated, "She's such a sweetie." After one last glance at the items Lal had brought home, her mother stood, "Well, I've got work to do, so you get some done too. Make sure you go to sleep on time!" Lal smiled. Her mother was a workaholic, ever since her father had passed away.

"Yeah, mom, don't worry, I'll do all that." Lal replied, hugging her mother before the older woman went off to her office for work. Lal grabbed her bag and made her way upstairs, pulling out her laptop and logging onto Skype and Facebook while she pulled out her homework for that night.

She had gotten through most of her calculus and all of her literature homework when she got a message from someone on Skype. The noise shook her from her thought and she glanced at the screen.

StuntmanSkl: _Lal!_

Lal stared at the screen for a second before she rolled her eyes and replied.

Lal66: _Hi, Skull._

StuntmanSkl:_ I hear you're going to prom._

Lal frowned. Reborn wouldn't bother telling the obnoxious freshman about that. He used the kid as his errand boy most of the time.

Lal66: _Who told you that?_

StuntmanSkl:_ Colonnello._

Lal scowled. That bastard army brat.

Lal66: _Well it isn't true._

StuntmanSkl:_ He said you're going with _him_._

That sent Lal over the edge. Skull must have figured that would, because he sent a hasty, '_Gotta go, bye!_' And then signed off. Lal barely even noticed – she was too busy gritting her teeth and searching facebook for Colonnello's number.

'_Got it._' She thought, her mood darkening by the second. Just as she was dialing the number into her phone to give him quite an earful, she got another call.

'_Reborn?_' She thought, annoyed as she saw his name appear on his phone.

"What do you want?" She barked when she picked it up. Reborn paused for a second before he spoke.

"Something wrong, Lalu?" He asked, using that god damned nickname she hated so much. Lal could hear the amusement in his voice, and grit her teeth at his attitude.

"I assume Skull already told you. Asshole." Lal shot back. She could hear Reborn's laughter on the other end, and said rather loudly into the phone, "This isn't funny, you dick!" Reborn's laughter stopped but he sounded just as amused when he spoke again, "Yes, he did. Don't bother talking to Colonnello about it, he'll just get the satisfaction of knowing he pissed you off. You know how he is." Lal frowned at Reborn's words.

"You're lucky I value your opinion, Spiffy." She muttered. She could almost see the smug grin on Reborn's face through the phone.

"Colonnello's pride's been completely hammered, I think yelling at him would only add salt to his wounds, anyway." Reborn added.

"I don't have any problems with that." Lal replied dryly.

"You're kind of a bitch sometimes, you know that Lalu?" Reborn chuckled.

"Stop calling me that, Spiffy." She shot back. Her dark mood was much improved thanks to Reborn, despite his obnoxious attitude.

"Soon as you stop calling me Spiffy, and it's a deal." Reborn retorted coolly.

"Never, because you love that nickname and you know it." Lal shot back.

After another fifteen minutes of talking, Lal figured it was about time she went to bed. At the next lull in the conversation, she announced, "I'm going to sleep now. See you tomorrow."

"Right. Don't dream about killing zipperhead too much now." Reborn replied. Lal smiled.

"No guarantees. Night, Reborn." She hung up after that, sighing and closing her laptop, shoving all the school stuff onto the floor.

'_Time for sleep. Finally_.'

The rest of the week went by rather uneventfully. Colonnello left her alone, which was unusual. Skull was being obnoxiously clingy, even more so than usual. Luce had come back from a vacation with a few friends and Reborn was once again trying to act cool when it was clear to everyone but Luce that he was head over heels in love with the girl. Lal figured he was feeling remorse for forcing her into going to prom with him instead of asking Luce.

"Reborn, you can go with Luce, if you want…" Lal had said to him. He just gave her a strange, alarmed look – very emotional and uncharacteristic for him – and avoided giving Lal a straight reply. In fact, he had trouble articulating properly at all when he spoke to her for the rest of the day afterward.

Fon had been at some sort of martial arts tournament, and of course came back with a plethora of awards. Viper had been quiet and unnoticed for the most part, and the only one acting normal, probably making money off drug deals and that underground fighting ring he had set up with the boxers. And his weirdo psychopath magic tricks.

And of course, there was Verde. No matter what any of them did to shake the creep, he just kept on coming back. He was constantly sneaking in his 'research' and trying to gain more data from using them. It was mostly trivial and simply irritating, but sometimes his damned research was a bit uncalled for and even dangerous. Weirdly, he'd been out from school the whole week. No doubt devising something to test out during prom that weekend. The freak most likely would drug the drinks there or something.

Lal sighed. Prom was the next night, and Yuni was planning to arrive at Lal's house a few hours before the event began. Although the girl was only a freshman, she was a good friend of Reborn's and she was Luce's sister, so she was going to prom with her sibling.

Lal glanced at the time, deciding she would go to bed early so she wouldn't be tired at all then Yuni came over to fuss with her clothes and hair for hours on end. She managed a smile and a chuckle, still amused that she had gotten herself into this mess. At least it would be over soon.

"Stupid fuckin' prom…"


	4. A Limo and a White Suit

**A/N: Three updates in a day because I LOVE YOU ALL. Also I like to procrastinate from my homework. But now that this is up, I need to actually get some work done...**

**I'm actually surprised that this story is getting so many views, because it was my understanding that high school AU is overdone and such. Which is true. But the plot bunny wouldn't leave me alone. **

**BUT REGARDLESS. Enjoy this chapter. There's some Lal/Reborn friendship, because I think that they would make good frenemies. Kinda like how Reborn and Colonnello are in the manga, lmao. **

**Once again this chapter has some awkward icky parts, but I think it's as good as it'll get with me editing it.**

**Thank you for reading, ad please enjoy!**

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"Laaaaaaluuuuuuu!" The high voice of Yuni tore Lal from her sleep. The cranky teen opened her eyes and rubbed them vigorously to rid them of the sleep.

"Lalu, I'm here!" Yuni called as she ran up the stairs to Lal's room. Lal groaned and looked at the time, eyes widening in shock when she took in the time.

"Four already?" She exclaimed keeping out of bed and running to shower quickly.

"Yuni, I'll be back in twenty minutes, I just need to shower!" She called. Yuni laughed and replied that she could prepare everything for her.

Lal finished with her shower in fifteen minutes and then dried her hair as best as she could with her towel.

"Hang on, silly, let me get out my hairdryer…" Yuni said while Lal pulled on underwear. Apparently she wouldn't need a bra with this dress – that did little to help Lal feel better about getting such a revealing dress. In the meantime she pulled on one of her stretched out sports bras and let Yuni do whatever it was she wanted to do with her hair.

Lal sat on a stool in her bathroom for what felt like years, but was in reality only half an hour. When Yuni was done, her hair had been successfully curled, and then arranged to her liking, Yuni announced that she would help Lal into her dress. Lal frowned and gingerly touched her hair. Even when it wasn't fully done, she had to admit that her hair looked wonderful.

"Thank you for your help, Yuni." Lal said with a genuine smile. Yuni smiled back.

"Anything for Reborn's friend." She replied. Both her and Lal shared a knowing glance. More like anyone for her sister's future husband's friend. Lal actually giggled a bit after that thought. Now that she was in a better mood, Lal found it easy to slip the dress on and to sit still while Yuni finished her hair. She had finally gotten a glimpse of herself in the mirror and stopped short When she took in how she looked with her hair down and curled and the dress fully laced.

"Do you believe me that you're beautiful in this now?" Yuni asked with a grin. Lal just stared at her reflection and reached a hand to play with the loose curls.

"Okay, enough gawking, there's still more I have to do! Then I need to get ready." Yuni wasn't going to let Lal ponder over how she looked long as she was ushered back onto the bathroom stool and began to pile on the makeup - at least it felt that way. When she was done Lal once again found it hard not to stare at her reflection in wonder. She looked like herself, but as Yuni put it, she had 'highlighted all Lal's best features'. Whatever that meant.

"I'm going to get ready now, you do whatever it is you want to do and once I'm done we can wait for my sister and Reborn. And _don't_ _mess up your hair_." The last bit was said in a very convincing mother-voice, and Yuni ran off before Lal could exclaim that they were coming to her house.

"Damn all these people..." Lal sighed, sitting at her desk chair and pulling out her laptop while she sneaked looks at her reflection in the mirror.

"Lal! Your friends are here!" Her mother called about an hour later. Yuni was pulling her dress over her head and adjusting her hair when that was called up. Both girls looked out the door and saw the car in front of her house.

"They bought a limo?" Yuni exclaimed and Lal finally took in the whole car. She stared in disbelief and was lead to the top of the stairs by Yuni, who knew that she was getting cold feet.

"Come on, let's get down these stairs and get those shoes on." She said, looping her arm through Lal's and forcing her down the steps.

"You know Yuni, I have to go to the bathroom..." Lal said with a tight smile. Yuni grinned and shook her head.

"You're not going anywhere, you coward." Lal scowled and stopped short at the bottom of the stairs when Yuni said that. Yuni pulled on her arm, and even thought she was taller, Lal didn't budge.

Until Yuni mentioned that she'd made a promise to Reborn that she would go, that is. That made Lal sigh, and she hesitated for a few seconds longer, but the moment she heard her mothers voice and then Reborn's in return she gave in. She _had_ promised him, and he was only trying to make her last year of school better. At least, that's what her mother had said.

"She's nearly ready, you can sit and have something to drink if you want." Lal's mother was talking with Reborn, and Lal once again felt that nervous fluttery feeling in her stomach. Why the hell did he torture her like this? Besides, he had a massive crush on Luce – what was his reasoning for asking _her_ to prom?

'_He probably figured I wouldn't say yes to anyone else.'_ Lal thought with a scowl growing on her face again.

"Lal, I don't know what you're thinking about, but stop it because you don't look very nice when you're scowling at your feet." Yuni laughed, moving her to sit so she could put her heels on. Lal thanked god that she had had experience wearing them before, or else there was no way she would have been able to walk in these god damned stilts.

"Alright, they're on, let's go!" Yuni chirped, pulling Lal to her feet and dragging her out into the room that Reborn and her sister were talking in. Thankfully the two didn't seem too engrossed in conversation (Lal would have felt horrible if she broke up any sort of intense conversation between the two). But of course, Reborn looked up the moment he heard the click of heels.

His reaction surprised Lal – the fact that he had one at all surprised her, but the way his eyes widened and he tilted his white hat up away from his eyes was a shock. He stood up and grinned, walking over to Lal and, to her dismay, still had to look down to look her in the eye.

"Now I know why Colonnello is always saying you should be more ladylike," The boy in front of her said. Lal tensed but Reborn moved on smoothly, pushing his hat back into its regular position over his unruly hair. He adjusted it slightly, and then with a soft smile told her, "You look beautiful, Lalu." Lal looked at him for a few seconds and a blush crept onto her cheeks, which made Reborn smile a bit wider.

"Did I embarrass you?" He asked, even more amused when she blushed further.

"Alright, alright, leave her alone, Reborn. You've had enough fun." Luce scolded the crazy-haired teen. Reborn turned and looked at her, and then his smile returned to its normal, soft smirk.

"Fine, fine…" He replied, and turned away to grab a box that had been sitting on the arm of the couch. He opened it up and pulled out a dark blue flowered wristlet. Lal tentatively held out her right arm, and Reborn slid the flower onto her wrist. She was glad to see his corsage was already on – she didn't even want to attempt that.

"Okay! Picture time!" Lal's mother exclaimed, ushering the group outdoors and spending a good twenty minutes snapping pictures of Lal and Reborn, Luce and her sister, Reborn and Luce (at the request of Yuni and Lal). Reborn's pathetic and nervous smile was enough to make Lal grin and accept his reaction as punishment for him dragging her into this stupid thing.

Just the girls got their own picture, and Reborn was forced to pose for Lal's mother, although he didn't seem to mind the attention. The white suit looked dashing on him, as Luce had put it, and Reborn seemed to be quite aware of that fact.

Finally the entire picture taking fiasco was done, and Lal's mother gave her a hug and a kiss on the forehead before sending them all on their way in the limo.

Once they were on their way, Lal remembered the question that she had had the moment she'd seen the limo.

"Why do we have such a big car for only four people?" She asked, looking between Reborn and Luce. Reborn's smirk and Luce's knowing smile put Lal on edge and she waited anxiously for their response.

"We're going to be picking up everyone else, too." Reborn replied, leaning back in his seat and slinging an arm around Lal's shoulders, the other resting on the back of the seat to his right. He looked at Lal for her reaction, eyebrows rising when she didn't seem to have much of one at all.

"Oh. Well that makes sense." Lal stretched her legs out as well, but immediately retracted them when her right leg, nearly up to her ass, became exposed because of the slit. Even though she felt okay when she wore somewhat revealing shorts and tank tops, this dress just felt different and a lot more like she wasn't wearing anything at all. Reborn, of course, found her discomfort highly amusing and removed his fedora to put it gingerly on top of her head.

"Feel more covered now, Lalu?" Reborn teased, making Luce and Yuni laugh as her face reddened.

"Bitch." She muttered taking the hat off and shoving it in Reborn's face, while the other two laughed even harder and Reborn flailed his arms around for a few seconds and then picked up the hat when it finally fell off his face.

The shenanigans continued for most of the ride, and the more people that were added to the limo (Fong and his date first, then Skull was dragged along by Viper, who said it was only for the amusement of the rest of the group), the crazier it got. Reborn had said something about Verde pestering him about letting him tag along, but Reborn made it clear he'd ignored the request.

The drive to pick everyone up had lasted for quite a while, considering the distance between the homes of everyone. Lal found herself with her shoes off and feet curled up beside her as she leaned against Reborn and listened to the conversation, chipping in every now and then when she felt the need. Reborn had his arm draped around her waist, but she could see easily that despite their cozy position he would rather be next to Luce. From the way he smiled and looked at her while she talked (and even when she wasn't), and the silly habit he had of curling his sideburns around his finger when she talked to him, Lal and most of the others were simply waiting for the two of them to finally get their acts together.

In the meantime, Lal didn't mind getting comfortable in Luce's place.

'_The best thing is that the army brat zipperhead isn't here.'_ Lal thought as she grinned and laughed at something Fong said. She might even _enjoy _this night.

She lifted her head from Reborn's shoulder when the limo stopped, muttering that the Empire Building the dance was going to be in wasn't that close to Viper's house.

"Euh? Why's is so quiet?" Lal questioned, looking around at the people in the car. Those who knew (Fong, Viper, Skull, Luce and Yuni) all smiled more or less convincingly at her and the pause conversation ended. Skull's smile looked almost painful and Viper smacked him on the back of the head before Skull giggled in that insanely high pitched voice of his and started babbling nonsense.

Lal sighed and settled back down against her human pillow, getting a grunt of discomfort from Reborn and just reaching a hand up to pat him on the top of his head in response.

"You dragged me into this, you suffer, Spiffy." She said with a grin. Reborn jus muttered profanities and tried to make himself more comfortable.

Her grin was wiped from her face as soon as she saw a blonde head step into the parked car. He turned and helped some other girl into the car as well, taking a seat and pulling the girl after him and into his lap. There were a chorus of hellos to the blonde from those who knew him well, and Reborn gave him a sly grin over Lal's head. Lal simply stared with wide, shocked eyes as she took all this in, frozen for a few seconds before she felt it was time to take action.

While all this was going on, the limo's door had been closed and the conversation had continued to a normal level. Reborn, however, was focusing on holding Lal down by his side with one arm around her waist while she fought to push it off and beat the shit out of the blonde sitting only a few feet away from her.

"Lal, calm down, geez." He muttered, actually having to strain a little bit to keep her from getting out of his grip.

"You asshole. You invited him? Why the hell would you _invite him_." She fought to keep her voice down low, and despite her anger she eventually relaxed and let Reborn help her into an upright position.

"I'm not going to keep Colonnello from riding with us just because you've got this weird hatred of him." Reborn muttered. He'd expected a negative response from Lal, but not this extreme.

"You know I hate him. You _know_." Lal hissed, gripping his upper arm and attempting to calm herself. Thankfully nobody noticed their conversation, and Lal managed to regain composure within a few minutes. Beneath her now calm and laid back façade Lal was unable to keep glancing over at Colonnello and the girl he'd brought with him.

Colonnello didn't bother to spare a single glance in the direction of Lal or Reborn – and Lal cursed him for it. What she didn't know was he was having a hard time not staring at her and all her gorgeous glory. The rest of the ride to prom was a mix of conflicting and confusing feelings for Lal, Reborn continually regretting doing this for his friend, and Colonnello doing his best to focus on the girl placed firmly in his lap.

Just before they got to their destination, Reborn sent one more look over Lal's head, catching Colonnello's eye and narrowing his own. Colonnello shot him a grin in response, his blue eyes narrowed slightly.

Reborn had no idea what _that_ meant.


	5. Dance with me?

**A/N: LONG CHAPTER WOO. And, a quick note on Colonnello's behavior; I so see him being a massive womanizer. I can't see him any other way. But Lal of course is his one and only :') Innn the meantime he'll dance like the whore he is with every girl he can.**

**I also decided Reborn's parents (or just his dad or something) will be in the mafia. So he wants to be too! Or, already is, since he's 18. Something like that. **

**I had a lot more to say but I forget what it is, and I'm sleepy. So enjoy this next chapter!**

**Also remember, I love reviews more than CAKE!**

**Enjoy~**

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When they arrived at their destination, Reborn and Lal were the last ones to leave the limo – and Reborn had a speedy conversation with his friend before they stepped out.

"Lal, you need to listen to me, okay?" Reborn said, leaning down slightly as to not bust his head open on the ceiling of the car, "Don't go after Colonnello tonight – I didn't intend this to be something you'll remember badly, nor do I want you in trouble." Reborn rarely had to plead with anyone, or even say anything twice. But Lal was an extremely violent and stubborn exception to this rule.

Lal stared him down for a good thirty seconds, the fire in her eyes almost enough to cause physical damage before she glared down and nodded curtly.

"Fine. You owe me, shithead." She muttered, making sure her shoes were on properly and grabbing a firm hold of Reborn's shoulder so she wouldn't fall on her face once she got out of the car.

"Let's go." She commanded, not wanting to hear any more.

When the two emerged from the car, it was if nothing had happened. Reborn had a pleasant smile on his lips and Lal looked radiant as she clutched his arm for support. Her shoes hurt her feet already.

"Come _on_ slowpokes, we're late!" Yuni called, and the group followed after her with laughter, shouts of enjoyment and smiles. Reborn's face broke into a wolfish grin when he took in the place that their prom was being held.

"Well this is a pleasant surprise…" He muttered. Lal glanced up at him and raised an eyebrow, but she didn't expect any answers. Reborn was a weirdo and she would simply have to accept that fact. She looked up at the name of the place a few seconds later, however, and realized what he meant.

Their prom happened to be at one of the most popular and sophisticated casino and dance clubs in their city. It was obvious which part made the grin appear on Reborn's face.

"Don't get arrested you dumbass." Lal elbowed him in the ribs as they walked into the club, and then returned her focus on walking properly. She felt the music before she heard it, unable to hide her surprise at the flashiness of the club and the loudness of the music. And the number of people, and the colors and lights and smell and shit her senses were being overwhelmed.

"Aaaalright I've got the experience we can go now Reborn!" She attempted to pull her arm from his. She didn't care – cold feet or no, she wasn't going to stick around this place. When he let her go, Lal thought he was giving in – but then he had wrapped his right arm around her waist, hugging her close to himself and keeping a tight grip on Lal's hip.

"You're not going anywhere, you coward." He told her with a smirk.

Lal frowned. She'd heard those words before.

Lal wasn't usually one to run away from things – well, anything at all really. But this was different. This was _way_ different than the challenge of sports and getting good grades in her classes. This was the kind of challenge that was stupid and pointless and did little to further her in life. At the moment she was simply sitting at a table that their group had picked out, casually watching over the empty bags that her friends had brought inside. For what reason, though, she was unsure.

It had only been twenty minutes, but so far Lal had managed to avoid dancing. Instead, she entertained herself with watching the mass of people on the dance floor. Lal had never been to this big of a social function run by the school before, but she knew how dances worked. She had to admit she didn't dislike the dancing style of the majority of couples, but she wasn't sure if it was to her tastes either.

'_Horny teenagers…_' She thought dismissively, not grouping herself in with that lot. She may as well be asexual, from the lack of any love life whatsoever. But she was extremely disappointed by that, and had had her share of hopeless crushes. Of course, being around guys her whole life gave her no indication of how to go about acting upon such feelings. Lal fought the urge to rub her eyes (god forbid she messed up her makeup) and instead searched the crowd of kids for the people she had come to prom with to see how they were handling the 'fun'. Reborn was busy doing some sort of two-person dance with a girl Lal couldn't make out, while Viper sat in the corner with a rare grin on his face, Skull looking nervous and glancing around at their classmates that had gathered around the pair. Luce was dancing uncharacteristically dirty with a tall and dark haired guy, and Reborn had stopped his dance and was now glaring daggers at the pair from across the room.

Colonnello caught Lal's eye next, some girl's ass grinding into his crotch and two other girls dry humping him from either side. At least, that's the way it looked to Lal. She made a disgusted face and looked away, wanting to feel the need to retch but instead feeling an angry heat rising up into her face.

'_Angry? Huh. Weird._' She thought in annoyance. Now even her emotions weren't making sense. Her thoughts kept her from sensing Reborn as he slid into the chair next to her, still giving off an aura of extreme hatred but attempting to mask it with an easy smile. She turned her head, slightly startled by his sudden presence, but the surprise turned to amusement as she caught the line of his slightly unnerving stare.

"Oh, calm down. Don't glare if you didn't do anything to prevent it." Lal scolded. Reborn turned his stare on her, giving her that creepy wolfish grin again.

"Wh…what are you smiling at." She didn't pose it as a question, because she had a feeling that she knew what was coming next. She barely resisted as Reborn pulled her from her chair and dragged her onto the dance floor, leaning down so he could say into her ear, "You remember how to dance the tango, right?" He asked, grin still in place and his hands now on her waist to keep her from running off. Lal nodded weakly, glad that their gym teacher had engrained the dance into her brain. Looks like he was going to attempt to make Luce jealous by using _her_. Good luck with that.

Before she knew it, her and Reborn were dancing along to what she recognized as "Hey Sexy Lady" by Shaggy. Reborn modified the steps to fit the beat of the song, adding a few little tricks of his own. Before she knew it even Lal was enjoying the speed and dancing.

"I think this song is more appropriate for you and Luce." Lal teased, holding back a gasp as she was suddenly bent over Reborn's arm with his face inches from hers. He grinned.

"I think I'm making somebody jealous." He chuckled, twirling her around before she had the chance to respond, confused. She caught a glimpse of a small crowd of people gathering around Reborn and her, smiling at the attention the two of them were getting for their unusual dancing. She was beginning to feel a little breathless from the exertion of dancing at this point, and said to Reborn the next chance she got, "You can end this at any time you know." Reborn nodded, ending the dance with once last twirl of his partner. He bent her backward once more to finish, and Lal tilted her head back to take in the sight of the crowd of people who had gathered around them. She caught sight of an incredulous Colonnello staring at her and Reborn in surprise, no whores in sight. Once she was finally back on her feet, there was a small round of cheering and then her fellow students continued their dance, leaving Lal thirsty and ready to grab some of the food they had been provided. Colonnello's expression stuck in the front of her mind like it was glued there, however.

She walked off to satisfy those needs, and as she did so, Reborn looked straight at Colonnello. With a cocky grin on his face and an unnecessary saunter, Reborn walked over to his tall friend and punched him none-too-gently in the shoulder.

"It's now or never, 'Nello." He said, using the pet name that Colonnello hated above all else. Colonnello winced and rubbed his 'injured' arm with a glare.

"Yeah. As if I can follow that act." Colonnello muttered sullenly, shoving his hands into his pockets and glaring down at his shoes. Reborn raised an eyebrow at his usually optimistic friend's suddenly pessimistic attitude. Showing no mercy, he punched him once more in the shoulder.

"You're gonna owe Viper a hell of a lot of money if you don't at least follow through with this part of it." Reborn called over his shoulder as he went off to find the other three of their group of friends. If Colonnello was going to grow a spine and do this, then he wanted everyone to be there to see it.

Lal had gone through two big red cups of water and was busy nibbling on crackers and whatever freaking delicious dip this was she had picked up. She'd resisted the urge to pile her plate with the stuff for fear she'd hurl if she decided to dance again. Despite her reluctance to go to prom she was actually rather glad that Reborn had invited her. That once dance with him was fun, and while she wanted to leave him open for Luce, she was seriously thinking about asking him for another.

She glanced up when she sensed someone walking toward the table, looking down almost immediately when she saw the telltale messy blonde hair. Suddenly, her food was incredibly interesting.

"U-uh, hi, Lal." His voice wavered a bit, and that surprised Lal. Usually he was practically sweating confidence to the point he would say almost anything to her. But right now, he seemed almost nervous.

Maybe it was because she'd kneed him in the crotch earlier in the week. She thought she _had_ kicked a little harder than was necessary.

"Hi." She grunted, taking another drink of her water and finally looking up at him. He paused for only a second before sitting down and leaning on the table with his elbows, shifting forward slightly. Lal stared him in the eyes coolly, holding his gaze in silence for a few moments before she said anything else.

"Need something–" Reborn had told her to be nice to him, and for some reason she'd decided that she would comply with the request, "–Colonnello?"

Colonnello had taken a cup off the table to drink and nearly spit it back into the cup when he heard her call him something other than army brat, zipperhead, or a myriad of other curses and racial slurs. He did his best not to choke on the water as he swallowed it, putting the cup down and letting a charming smile slide into place on his face.

"Oh, just a question…" He trailed off, glancing down at the water, then off to the side somewhere. Lal turned her head slightly and saw Reborn, Luce, Viper, Skull and Fon all sitting at a table and looking a little _too_ engrossed in their conversation. Lal narrowed her eyes, staring at them intensely. As if he had felt her glare, Skull turned his head slightly, caught her gaze, looked like he was going to pass out from fear and then whipped his head back to the group, his mouth moving a mile a minute as he began to participate animatedly in the conversation.

'_What…?'_ Lal wondered, a little suspicious. But before she could ponder it any longer, Colonnello's voice drew her attention.

"Would you, um, like to…dance with me?" The blonde asked, and Lal nearly fell off her chair at the request.

"Will I…will…wh…wh-wh…what did you…what?" Lal suddenly found herself unable to speak as confusion and surprise overcrowded all other thought and emotion.

"I-it's okay if you don't want to, 'cause I uh, I mean, I know you don't really, um…" Colonnello's voice was tuned out as Lal turned to her inner thoughts. The boy continued to ramble, while she had her own rambling internal conversation.

'_Why is he suddenly so nice to me? We hate each other. Never been different. He lives to piss me off. I beat the crap out of him. Why would he ask me to dance? What the hell is going on. Seriously. What the _hell_?'_

"Lal?" Colonnello repeated her name for the third time, since the girl had gotten some faraway look in her eyes and he knew that she had tuned him out. He'd seen her do this to Reborn before when he ranted about some mafia-related thing.

"Wh—y-yeah?" She asked, still confused how to respond to this weird request.

"So um. Yes or no to dancing with me?" He was getting antsy, and could feel the stares of all four of their friends from across the room.

Lal could too.

And that was when she decided that this was some kind of fucking _joke_ they were all playing on her. And Colonnello knew it, which was why he was so nervous – he _knew_ that she would see through it and he would get his ass completely whooped.

Fuck being nice to him, because Reborn was obviously in on this too.

Lal stood up slowly, glad she was still wearing her heels because she towered over him while he was sitting. She walked over to him, a tiny smile on her lips and a hand trailing along the table as she did her best to take slow, sexy steps. Colonnello's nervousness completely disappeared when she was walking like that, figuring that at this point he wasn't going to get his ass kicked and he was _actually_ going to get to dance with Lal.

Wrong.

The slap stung like he couldn't even describe.

He actually fell out of his chair, and without even bothering to look down at him Lal walked off, not feeling much better at all. Colonnello lay on the floor for only a few seconds before he sat up with a groan, hanging his head down between his bent knees and muttering swear words.

"Thank you, Reborn." he finally growled sarcastically, heaving himself to his feet and slumping into a chair, continuing to curse that fucker he called his best friend in his head.

Reborn had gathered the others to watch the show. He had pleaded with Lal to be nice to Colonnello and was certain that this part of the night, at least, would turn out as planned. Lal would listen to most anything he had to say, and he was counting on that. The five were sat at a table and talking about the current situation, doing their best to look engrossed in the conversation.

"I don't see this going well." Viper sighed, leaning back in his chair with his head turned so he stated at Skull. His hair covered his face, so it was impossible to tell where he as looking but that, of course, unnerved Skull. He fidgeted for a few minutes, feeling a burning desire to look over at Colonnello and Lal, but knowing he would get his ass kicked if he did.

"Stop being such a pessimist, Viper! It'll go well." Fon said calmly in reply. Reborn nodded in agreement.

"This will turn out fine, Viper." He said with certainty and crossed arms. His hat was tilted down as he leaned back, making it look like he was dozing.

"Wanna bet, Spiffy?" Viper replied smoothly. Reborn tilted his fedora up with a thumb, one eyebrow raised before he shrugged.

"Sure. I'll win either way. Thirty bucks." Reborn retorted. The vicious smile that spread across creepy Viper's face unnerved Reborn, but they both slapped the money down onto the table regardless.

"You're going to be thirty bucks poorer after a few minutes, Creepy." Reborn chuckled. Viper just kept the grin in place and resumed 'staring' at Skull.

Skull lost his nerve and turned his head away And of course he ended up staring right at Lal and catching her very intense glare. His eyes went wide and he began to panic, gripping the table tightly, holding her narrow eyed stare for only a few seconds before he whipped his head back to the others.

"H-h-h-h-hey so wh-why are w-we all grouped t-t-together like th-this? W-won't she s-s-suspect something?" The panicking high schooler said, while the three boys stared at him with various expressions. Reborn was glaring with narrowed eyes, Fon had that unreadable but slightly pleasant look and Viper was still grinning oh-so-creepily. Luce seemed somewhat disinterested in all of this. Skull pulled a tight-lipped and strained grin, and Reborn was seriously about to punch the idiot's face in when Luce put a hand on his arm.

"Don't, Reborn." She said, looking at him with an unreadable expression. The mafia kid relaxed visibly after a few seconds with his right arm raised, as the other three knew he would. He just turned his head toward the table that his two friends sat at without saying a word, looking a little pouty. The other three men at the table followed suit (if Skull could be considered anything but a baby), staring at Lal and Colonnello. Even Luce was looking, finally a little interested in the outcome of this little encounter.

She was with Viper on this one; Lal wasn't going to change if Colonnello attempted to stop making the small girl angry. She would get angry at anything he said or did, because that's how things were since the two had met in seventh grade.

When Lal stood up, Skull looked nervous, Viper's grin got even wider, Luce leaned forward a little and Reborn spoke.

"Get ready to lose your thirty buc—" He stopped talking mid-sentence, mouth hanging open as Colonnello was ousted from his chair and Lal walked off, a nasty look on her face. She looked like she was headed for the bathrooms, and that meant she was headed right for the table of conspirers. The only one she looked at was Reborn, however. And that glare was enough to make even _him_ a little scared.

Fon actually flinched when he saw Colonnello's head snap to the side, Skull ducked his head and even Viper's smile dropped a notch. But it was back in place the second she passed as he collected the money on the table.

"Looks like she knows you did something, Spiffy." Viper said while counting out the money he'd snatched off the table. Reborn's eyes were trained on the door that Lal had left through, until he was finally able to shake some sense into himself and look over to Colonnello. The blonde had gotten back into his seat and had a hand on his cheek where he'd been slapped, staring with a glum look on his face into the cup in front of him.

Reborn clenched his fists and glanced around at the group. Viper was busy chuckling to himself while he recounted the money and Skull looked a little sad. Luce was staring at Colonnello, deep in thought. Fon looked a little shocked, but mostly concerned for his blonde friend. With an exasperated sigh, he stood.

"I'm going to talk to Lal." He announced, leaving the room and ignoring a call of protest from Fon and Skull. At least someone cared for his well-being. He found Lal leaning against the wall next to the girl's bathroom, a weird expression on her face and her hands kneading the loose folds of her dress.

"Lal?" Reborn called, approaching her carefully to avoid getting a palm print on his face as well. Lal looked up sharply, her expression turning from unreadable, to anger, and then to what Reborn could only explain as sad.

"What." She sighed, standing up straight as Reborn walked over to her.

"You don't look very angry." He said. Lal rolled her eyes.

"No shit, Sherlock." She replied, the weird expression she'd had on earlier replaced with a tiny, forced smile.

"What happened?" He asked, making her cross her arms and give him an 'are you stupid?' look.

"You should know already. Why the hell would you guys play some dumb ass joke on my like that?" She asked, looking more annoyed than hurt. Reborn looked a little surprised, however.

"That wasn't a joke, Lal." He said bluntly. Lal looked at him with an equal amount of surprise.

"It…what?" Reborn fought back a smile. So Colonnello _did_ have a chance.

"I don't know what he asked you, but whatever it was, it was genuine." Reborn said.

"He asked me to dance." She stated simply.

"Well?" Reborn replied with raised brows.

"Well what?" She shot back, avoiding answering the question that she knew was coming.

"Do you want to?" Lal looked away from Reborn with her left arm wrapped across her middle and the other holding a piece of hair, chewing it and glaring at the wall to her right as if it was the most important thing in the world.

"You do. I know it, and you should at least give him that after you slapped him like that." Reborn continued, "Shit, Lal, _I_ could feel that and I was halfway across the room." Lal looked at him, an idea coming to mind that made her face light up. That made Reborn wary, but if it would get her to dance with Colonnello he figured he was safe.

"I'll dance with him if you dance with Luce." She said simply. Reborn looked relieved, shrugging and letting loose a chuckle before he said, "I can do that."

"I mean grinding, by the way." She added, moving to walk away. Reborn froze and then grabbed her arm, starting to shake his head.

"I'll go talk to Colonnello now. If I don't see you and her on that dance floor the next fast song, you'll be in _huge_ trouble." Lal pulled out of his grip and walked quickly off, leaving Reborn standing there with his mouth slightly open and a weird nervous feeling in the pit of his stomach.

God damned women.


	6. It's Not a Bet!

**A/N: OKAY WELL. Here's another chapter. I added a little speculative Luce/Reborn fluff. It's very vague. And I have a tendency to put in specific song names when they inspire me to write. Such as the reference to Back In Time by Pitt Bull. That song is basically what made me write this whole thing! So while you guys may not be able to hear it while you read...it's there anyway. **

**Once again, Colonnello is a horny teenager, so please do excuse his teenage boy-ness when booty and attractive women are all up in his face. Or other parts of him. I find this younger, unabashed version of him very fun to write. Although it may be incredibly out of character. **

**And I wonder what Fon, Viper and Skull could be up to...dun dun duuun.**

**With that, I give you chapter six! Please, enjoy!**

**And, as always, reviews are super duper incredibly appreciated!**

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Colonnello was still staring down dejectedly into his empty water cup when he heard someone pull back the chair across from him. He looked up to see Lal sitting there, looking at him with a small smile on her face. Figuring she was only there to add insult to injury, he looked back down and muttered a half-hearted "Go away."

He wasn't surprised when she didn't move. But he _was_ surprised when she spoke.

"I'll dance with you, if it'll help you win that bet with those idiots." Lal motioned toward the four left at the table across the room. Colonnello looked at them for a second, feeling very confused, but deciding that if it would get him a chance to dance with Lal he could work with the lie. Sure Viper was determined to make the whole damned thing into some money making scheme, but Colonnello didn't really want any part in that. None at all. But at the same time, he wanted her to know that he had thought of this on his own.

And Lal had to be honest with herself; she didn't want to admit that she actually, to some extent, wanted to dance with him. But she did want to. It was weird, not feeling anger and annoyance whenever she saw his face, however she didn't dislike the feeling. And the smile that was on his face now actually made her grin a little bit more as well.

"Well…to be honest, it's not a bet." The blonde said, looking down and running a hand through his already mussed-up hair. He looked back up at Lal to see a slightly shocked look on her face.

"You…what?" she said, confused. Not only confused at his words, but confused at the fluttery feeling she'd gotten in her stomach. Was he telling the truth? She had thought Reborn said the whole ordeal wasn't a bet just to get her to dance with his friend.

"This isn't a bet, Lal. I swear." Colonnello looked at her. And something about the look in his eyes made her accept what he had to say as fact. She continued to stare at him, her stomach twisting in knots now. It was weird, to feel these nervous, fluttery feelings in place of the annoyance and hate she usually felt toward this infuriating fool.

The song changed to a slower one and Colonnello stood up. He held a hand out to Lal, waiting expectantly for her to take it, still a little nervous. Lal hesitated for only a second before she stood up, a little disappointed that even with her shoes her eye height was only about at his chin.

_So she wouldn't have to crane her neck to see Reborn's face._

Oh, that bitch. That_ bitch_. She _knew_.

Was it just her? Maybe Colonnello had gone to her for advice. Sure. That made sense. But why Yuni, and not Luce?

Her mind was moved from those thoughts when she realized how painful the shoes were.

"I'm gonna take these off…" She muttered, stepping away from him and then bending down to slip the shoes off. Colonnello nodded, about to look around the room to pass the time, until he actually saw her bend. His mouth dropped open a little as he got a very nice look at a good part of her hip and all of her right leg, and did his best to fight off the sexual thoughts that came to mind.

In an attempt to distract himself, Colonnello looked up over to the other side of the room, shoving his hands deep into his pockets and thinking of very non-sexy, manly things.

Like dead kittens. And dirt. And zombies, and weapons. And hairy body parts. Amidst all the manly thoughts, Colonnello caught sight of Reborn. His friend had a massive grin on his face and abruptly turned around and slapped his own ass when he caught Colonnello's gaze. Colonnello flinched because that made him think about Lal and how she was bent down in front of him and oh _god_ did she—

"Ahh. Better." Lal chirped, sliding the shoes under the table and then standing in front of Colonnello again. The blonde was still struggling with his thoughts a bit, but now that he could look at Lal's face, focusing them was easier.

Lal sighed. This time she had a nice view of his _chest_. She looked up and he couldn't help but grin at their height difference.

"Hi there shorty." He chuckled, composure finally regained as he slipped an arm around her waist and lead her off to the dance floor. Lal didn't even feel a spark of anger when he called her that. And worried her a little, because she'd lived with this hate of Mr. Army Brat for so long.

She elbowed him half heartedly in the side, muttering back "Shut up, army brat." But somehow the insult didn't mean as much when she had this weird feeling in her stomach and a smile on her lips.

Lal had no idea what she was doing once they had moved into the sea of already dancing couples, so she let Colonnello move her arms around his neck and slide his hands down to her hips. She looked up at his face, realizing that if Yuni's goal was to make their heights more compatible, she had the right idea. Her neck would probably start to hurt after a while, now that she didn't have her shoes on.

"You don't mind if I just look here, right?" Lal asked, turning her head to a more neutral position and staring at his chest, a little amused by their height difference. Colonnello laughed and leaned his head down so he could speak to her more easily.

"I don't care. You do what you want, Lal." Colonnello didn't want to do anything that might possibly piss her off, because he was happy with how they were right now and didn't really want his balls smashed in again. He didn't want to her to hate him anymore, either. He just wanted _her_.

The two were silent for most of the song, and only about thirty seconds later Lal got tired of staring at his chest and stepped close so she could lay her head on it instead. She felt the vibration of him humming along quietly to the song and smiled, while Colonnello let a grin come onto his face at her proximity.

Before the two knew it, the song had ended and moved into a faster paced one. Lal glanced up at Colonnello and took her arms from around his neck. He slid a hand to the small of her back in order to hold her close to him for a few seconds longer. Neither exchanged any words. They just stared, Lal unsure how she really felt, Colonnello holding his ecstasy and displaying it in his usual half-hearted smirk.

Lal flashed one last smile at the taller man and then pulled herself away from his warmth. Colonnello kept his hand on the small of her back until she was too far away to reach, letting it drop to his side once she had gone. His smile fell and he squeezed his way through the thick crowd of people, his elated feeling dropping the moment she had left him.

Lal had gone to hunt down Reborn, determined to get him and Luce to dance dirty right then and there. After her dance with Colonnello, she was feeling energized and intensely mischievous. She saw him sitting alone with Luce, the two of them talking and laughing while Viper, Fon and Skull where nowhere in sight. Lal wondered briefly where Yuni was, before deciding the girl didn't really want to hang out with her older sister's friends for the whole of prom.

"Well hey there, Lal." Reborn drawled as he saw her approach, leaning back in his chair and draping his arms over the back. The smirk on his face was infuriating. It was Lal's turn to smirk when the song changed again.

"Well look at that, this song has a pretty nice beat to it!" She watched Reborn's expression change from a cocky grin, to confusion and finally to dismay as he caught her drift.

"You two should go dance." Lal continued smoothly. Much to Reborn's dismay Luce grinned and nodded in agreement. She stood up and grabbed Reborn's hand, dragging him to his feet.

"Let's go, Reborn!" she said, a spark in her eyes and a grin on her face while the young mafioso glared at Lal as if he could shoot bullets from his narrowed eyes. After one final prod from Luce, he stood, keeping his eyes on Lal as he walked off. Reborn kept his glare on the raven-haired girl, mouthing a sour, "You fucking bitch." Before he lost eye contact with Lal.

Lal just smiled and waved as he was pulled off into the crowd, feeling good about this payback.

Colonnello was once again staring into the bottom of an empty cup, and while he normally would be sexing it up on the dance floor, he just wasn't feeling like it right then.

Of course, he knew why, and he knew that his one chance to dance with Lal was over. And once this night was done she would probably go back to glaring daggers at him whenever he was within seeing distance.

If he was completely honest with himself, his want to fight back had completely died when they entered their sophomore year. Up until then, the two had competed at everything - school, sports, in gym class, even with the attention of their friends. They had bristled whenever they saw one another all those years ago and there had been more than one physical altercation during and after school hours.

What had angered Colonnello the most the most was that Lal was, for some reason or another, always better than he was. Colonnello blamed her superiority on the fact that they had remained the same size for the longest time. Which was incredibly embarrassing for Colonnello since Lal was just barely five three and had been since seventh grade.

The thing that had begun his change in opinion occured after the summer prior to Freshman year. Lal had looked and acted male for nearly all of her life. She'd had a boyish haircut, wore men's clothing, was flat as a pancake and had a generally masculine air about her. She liked to get dirty and wasn't afraid to get physical during gym and sports, while the rest of the girls squealed if the ball so much as moved in their general direction.

But something happened that summer and the boyishness started to fade; when she came back to school freshman year Lal still lacked feminine curves but she wore less of the basketball shorts and baseball tees and more skinny jeans and fitted shirts. She even let her hair grow out so it was shoulder length, as opposed to a short and boyish pixie cut.

His dislike of her began to fade then, and it led Colonnello to believe he had never really disliked her much at all. It was just their natural competitive nature and his weird need to get her riled up that had fueled the strange relationship.

Then came sophomore year and holy shit was he shocked. He didn't see her for the first few days of school and was starting to think she had moved or something. But in reality what had happened was she was changed.

A lot.

When he first realized the girl with the long blue-black hair who sat to his left in homeroom was Lal, he didn't believe it. So he asked Reborn. The mafia kid had laughed at him for a good minute before he confirmed Colonnello's guess.

"You didn't recognize her?" Reborn asked after he was done laughing at Colonnello's stupidity.

"Well...no. I mean. She, uh..." and he grabbed his chest where he would have tits if he was a girl. Reborn laughed again.

"Yeah, she grew a lot over the summer. Still short though. Like you." Reborn had hit a growth spurt that summer and stood at a hefty five eleven, while Colonnello was still a midget in comparison. Even _Skull_ was taller than Colonnello, and that was just embarrassing.

"Shut up, asshole. I'm gonna grow. My dad's six five." Colonnello desperately hoped he would grow. Because his mom was pretty short, and if he was going to be stuck at five four for the rest of his life, well…he may as well just end it now.

After that, Colonnello couldn't help but sneak looks at this girl who…actually looked like a girl. He got his ass kicked plenty for it, too, because while he was feeling a little differently about Lal then, she clearly hadn't had a change of heart.

And it was halfway through this year that he determined that he'd developed a massive crush on Lal. He didn't say a word to anyone about it for the longest time, but of course stupid Spiffy figured it out pretty quickly. And it was only because he spent a lot of his time with Lal and knew Colonnello like the inside of his stupid fedora.

"So…zipperhead." Reborn drawled while leaning against Colonnello's locker toward the end of their sophomore year. Colonnello hated that name, but it didn't bother him too much when Lal said it. Not anymore.

"What, Spiffy." He growled back, closing his locker and then looking at the grinning Mafioso.

"How ya doin'." The grin on his face was unnerving.

"I'm…good." Colonnello replied warily, staring up slightly at his friend (he'd finally begun to grow, thank god).

"How's the love life?" Colonnello knew now then that something was wrong here.

"Non existant. I'm short, remember?" That was a lie. Despite being a short kid, he was good looking and had plenty of girls after him. It hadn't gone to his head quite yet.

"Ah." Reborn replied. "So, no luck with Lal?" The goddamned dick's sudden question shocked Colonnello into silence. Reborn laughed, and walked off, because that was all the answer he needed.

Ever since then, Reborn had always dropped hints when Lal was around. But she didn't suspect a thing because he hated Colonnello's guts, so Colonnello just did his best not to choke his obnoxious friend. For each and every bit of innuendo that suited freak slipped into his conversation. It was really, truly difficult.

It took until the end of their junior year for Colonnello to reach his full height of six three, and at that point he was the one calling Reborn a midget. He used to be a very skinny kid, but once he joined the schools' rugby team and started to work out more seriously, he had become more like the strong, ruggedly handsome man he was. At least, that was how he thought of himself.

And that was when he was certain that he had the biggest attraction to the practically Spartan woman who he had competed with for so many years. Of course, she still hated him and just called him weak and pathetic, always commenting how he didn't fight back against her anymore. She even questioned whether or not he had gone through with the basic training over their summer vacation, later on.

But the reason for his lack of a will to fight he could never tell her. One, because she would laugh in his face and then promptly pound it in and two, because he would never, ever, live the confession down. Even Fon and Luce would make fun of him for the rest of his miserable existence.

It was only a matter of time before Reborn told the others, though. And once he did Colonnello didn't hear the end of it. He still hadn't. Bets were constantly being made between the boys about how obvious they could be about Colonnello's hopeless love in front of Lal before she found out or how many times Colonnello got nervous and ran off when he saw her, or how many times he was caught staring at her boobs during the school day.

The last one was a favorite.

Luce and Yuni were more sympathetic, but Colonnello could tell that it was a stretch for even them to remain reasonable for this whole affair.

And then Reborn finally decided to help his friend out. Either the torture he was putting Colonnello through bored him or he actually grew a heart where the obvious black hole in his chest was and wanted to help is friend. Regardless, Reborn told Colonnello he would get him and Lal together by the time they graduated. And now this was where they left off.

Well, he got one dance out of her. Colonnello smiled. That was enough for him.

"You look sad." The voice made Colonnello's head shoot up, and he stared slightly open mouthed at Lal, who stood across the table from him with a hand on her hip. Colonnello did his best to keep his eyes above her neck, but _damn_ was it hard. He had found it hard to do that when she wore normal clothes, but now even with a quick glance he could see a good portion of her stomach and side, and the dip in the neckline of the dress was—

"Colonnello?" She sounded a little annoyed, and he guiltily snapped his head back up to stare her in the face, forcing a charming smile onto his face and asking innocently, "Yes, Lal?" He was tense though, expecting some sort of retaliation.

"Eyes up, zipperhead. And I said that you looked sad." Colonnello had to fight back a wide-eyed look of surprise. Had she just used a _gentle_ voice with him? And as far as he knew, his nuts were intact and the only thing that hurt was his cheek where he'd been smacked earlier.

"I-I-I-I-u-uh." Colonnello stammered, finally catching himself and continuing much more smoothly, "I-I'm fine. Just thinking about stuff."

"Like?" She asked, sitting down and leaning on the table with her elbows.

"Oh, y'know, life, fun things like that." Colonnello said dismissively. Lal smiled.

_'Holy shit. She smiled.'_ Colonnello thought, once again trying to keep his expression cool, calm and collected.

Before Lal was able to make any more conversation, three girls came over to her and started chattering about dancing and music and other things that Colonnello found hard to keep up with. He just watched as she was dragged off, seemingly against her will. He sighed. Clearly someone was against him getting some time to talk to Lal.

His eyes followed the girls as they squeezed onto the dance floor (which was already too full of people) and his eyes widened when they started to dance. He had honestly never seen Lal dance before, and he'd expected her to be horrible because of that. But she honestly was…well…_god_ she was good. It could have been his attraction to Lal speaking then, but the way she moved was anything but amateurish. Colonnello found himself staring intently at her, until his attention was dragged away by a pair of arms drawing over his shoulders from behind.

"We haven't danced for a while, Colonel." The girl behind him purred. The nickname and the way she said it made Colonnello tense up, standing without even thinking and putting an arm around the girl's waist. As much as he was interested in Lal, he wasn't going to let his crush on her prevent him from having a good time. He sauntered off to dance far, far away from Lal with the girl who had stolen his attention. Just in case she saw and got one of her 'I-want-to-kill-you' moods.

Colonello danced for a song or two, switching partners every few minutes and eventually found himself dancing around a small group of girls that was right next to Lal and her friends. The beat of the song changed and Colonnello couldn't help but stare at Lal as she danced, eventually making a decision that 'Back In Time' was a great song to grind to. And that he would take the risk of losing his dick to get some of that ass.

With a determined look on his face, Colonnello went in for the kill, sliding up behind Lal and putting his hands on her hips, pulling her back against him and following her movements with his own hips. He braced himself for some pain below the belt, but only felt some 'nice feelings' as Lal backed up into him a little more.

_'Scoooooreee!_' Was about the extent of Colonnello's train of thought at this point, not even using his mind to make the decisions now. Not a single thing was going to separate him from Lal right now. He slipped his left hand through the lacing that left most of her stomach exposed, clutching at her right hip and running his fingers over her bare skin. He couldn't see her expression, but he assumed that since he was still standing she didn't _hate_ his dancing.

Lal's first thought had been to beat the shit out of the horny army brat, but she was able to ignore the urge and just enjoy the dancing. In fact, she was fairly certain that the urge to attack was purely reflex now. Because she really didn't feel annoyance or anger – she actually felt a little flattered that he still wanted to dance with her, despite the obvious risks involved. And she sure as hell was enjoying it – Lal was certain that the army brat was too, because he would grip her hip and dig his fingers into the exposed skin on her stomach every time she moved her hips in a way that brought her closer to him.

Both Lal and Colonnello were completely unaware of everything going on around them, and neither had any objections with that fact. Colonnello was happy he was getting more time this close to Lal.

And Lal was just happy to finally sort out her feelings for this infuriating bastard.


	7. Just Kidding

**A/N: Slightly shorter chapter this time...I felt the end was a good enough cut off point. I figured I would toss in some more Luce/Reborn fluffsies, and some fun angsty action to this chapter!**

**To JohnnyB, since I can't reply directly to your review...I probably should have asked one of my MALE friends for what to write for the un-sexy manly part, lmao. Being of the female variety I've never really had any experience in that area. **

**Nooow you all enjoy this next chapter~**

**Chapter 8 may take a little longer to update since I only have about 500 more words already written past this chapter. I'll have another update in a week's time, at the very latest.**

**Enjoy, and remember, I love reviews :)**

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Reborn had finished dancing with Luce several songs ago, and now was enjoying himself just sitting with her leaned up against him and an arm secured around her shoulder.

"Oh, look, Colonnello managed to scrape up the courage to dance with Lal again…" He drawled, letting his head tilt down against the top of Luce's while he dragged his gaze around the mass of dancing people. He spotted Viper in a corner of the room and narrowed his eyes, confused but figuring the idiot was trying to make some money off condoms or something back there. What he didn't notice was the green-haired kid in the white suit Viper was speaking with.

The song changed and Reborn expected Lal and Colonnello to break apart, but when the music of the next fast-paced grinder picked up and Colonnello seemed to think he was done, Lal's hands curled around to the back of the tall blonde's thighs and held him in place. Reborn chuckled.

"Well there's a surprise. Things are going well." Luce looked up when Reborn said that, glancing at Colonnello and Lal and then smiling and shaking her head.

"You know, you're not much different than Colonnello, when it comes to scraping up courage." Reborn twitched when Luce said that, lifting his head and turning it to look at her with wide, shocked eyes.

"I…what?" For once the usually infuriatingly witty and calm mafioso was speechless. Luce laughed, patting his leg and standing up.

"Leave those two alone, Reborn." She said, leaning down and tilting the white-suited man's head up. Reborn stared at her with a look in his eyes that he tried desperately to hide. It was anticipation and excitement simply because he assumed the best possible scenario with Luce's face being so close to his. But he was left disappointed when Luce smiled cheerily at him and then walked off, most likely to find her sister and Skull.

Reborn leaned back in his chair, muttering curses and rubbing his eyes. This was Lal's fault. Stupid Lal. Making him dance with Luce and then let his guard down. All her stupid midget fault.

Reborn was determined to build his usual exterior out quickly. Before he knew it, at least another half an hour had passed – and that was when all hell broke loose.

Colonnello and Lal had finally stopped dancing, and the two holding onto one another as they made their way to get something to drink. Colonnello had a triumphant grin on his face while he had one arm around her with his hand resting on her hip, while Lal simply had a pleased smile that turned her lips up. She had one arm tightly clutching his waist mostly because she felt more than a little wobbly-legged at the moment. As they left the dance hall to get their water, Viper slid up next to Colonnello with a creepy as hell smile on his face.

"Guess what, army brat!" He said, his grin only growing as the two slowed to a halt and Lal kept one arm tightly around Colonnello's waist.

"What do you want, creep." Colonnello sighed, not expecting anything important. But what the creepy kid said next nearly made him fall over.

"You won the bet. I didn't think you'd get through fifty girls in a night, but you did." He glanced at Lal with that grin, and watched as her expression turned from the pleased one she started with, to confused, to understanding and then finally to that expression they all knew and loved. That scowl that made her look scarier than Reborn in a bad mood. And that was the end for poor, poor Colonnello. He cried out in pain as Lal stomped as hard as she could on his foot, and then punched him much harder than necessary in the jaw, making him stumble back and stare at her with wide eyes.

"L-lal—"

"You're an asshole, you fucking whore," She interjected, jabbing him in the chest with a finger, "You said it wasn't a bet." She paused and took a breath, cracking the knuckles of her right hand and then turning to Viper. The purple-haired illusionist's grin slipped away and he realized that he was going to face the brunt of Lal's anger as well.

_'Oh well,'_ Viper thought glumly as Lal's fist headed toward his face, _'At least I made some money.'_ And then he was knocked to the ground.

Reborn was back to holding Luce close with an arm around her shoulders, talking to her about various trivial topics while the dance continued on around them. His head shot up when he heard a few shouts and yells and he looked over to their souce in time to see Lal punching Viper's lights out. He glanced around the area the two were in and noticed Colonnello edging away from her obviously angry form very slowly and carefully. He groaned in exasperation.

"And he was so close, too." He grumbled. But there wasn't much that could be done now, and Colonnello would have to be the one to solve the problem. This wasn't anything _Reborn_ was interested in fixing, even if he could. He glanced up when the two underclassmen came back from wherever it was they had been, Fon trailing along behind them. Rebron quickly turned his gaze back over to Colonnello as the idiot was staring down at Viper and then looking at Lal as she stormed across the room to the exit the school. The blonde idiot just stood there, dumbfounded and clearly incapable of sentient thought.

With a hefty sigh, Reborn stood up.

"Luce, I'm going to go pick up the pieces. Can you make sure that Viper's okay? And make sure blondie doesn't do anything stupid." Luce looked exasperated, but nodded and pushed Skull in the direction of Viper while she told Yuni to go find her friends and enjoy herself. Fon told Skull to stay put and took his place in bringing Viper over to their table instead. Luce followed after Fon to go clean up the mess, looking back at Reborn as he walked after Lal.

Reborn was right. Colonnello was doing so well and Lal had looked so happy – what could have possibly set her off?

_'That fucking douchebag. What the hell. I can't believe I _fell_ for that._' Lal's thought pattern remained about the same as she walked, determined, to the exit. She needed cool air and then she was going to tell Reborn that she was leaving and there wasn't a thing he could do to stop her.

Not a single thing would stop her getting what she wanted—

"Lal."

Reborn's voice made her falter in her determined rampage, and when she felt his hand on her shoulder she stopped, turning around to glare up at him. She held his stare for a good few seconds before she glared off to the side and tried to shake his hand off.

"Lal, stop." Reborn sighed, tightening his grip on the shorter girl's shoulder and opening his mouth to speak again. But Lal spoke first, determined to have her way.

"I'm leaving, Reborn. That _asshole_ played me." She paused for a laugh, "And I didn't even suspect it."

"You're not leaving. Feel free to mope in any corner of the room you'd like, but I'm not going to let you go. Remember, I'm the one who brought you and you might offend me if you leave early." Reborn smirked as Lal's scowl deepened, glad that it was so easy to send her on a guilt trip.

"Fine. Fine. Whatever. But if _he_ comes near me I swear to god I will castrate him. Twice."

Reborn didn't doubt it.

"Were going to the after party, by the way. Yuni brought you some stuff that you can change into." Lal's expression changes honestly amused Reborn, and he couldn't help but smile as a horrified expression replaced her previously furious one.

"You just like to make me suffer don't you." She muttered. Reborn smiled.

"That's my job. You won't run off and make me feel bad, will you?" Reborn had to clarify. Lal usually kept her word. Usually.

"Fine. I'll stay. But you owe me. Big time." Lal muttered, anything but pleased. But that was good enough for Reborn.

"Now if you'll excuse me I have to go gamble." Reborn patted her on the top of her head before he walked off with his hands in his pockets and a smirk on his face.

Lal just watched him go, sitting down on the nearest chair and putting her head in her hands.

The dance was winding down and Luce was still taking care of Viper, while Colonnello was still sitting in the same chair he had been in nearly two hours ago, his expression mopey and downcast. Yuni had come back because her friends had left and was sitting with Skull, talking about something or other concerning drama within their grade. Fon had been dragged off by his date, so Luce was virtually left alone to care for these two fools.

Luce sighed. Viper always had to do stupid things like this, and she was usually the one left to clean it up. It, quite honestly, sucked. But she had to do it, considering she was basically the mother of their entire strange group of friends.

"Luuuceeee my face huuurts..." Viper's whiny voice pierced through Luce's thoughts and she was forced to turn to him.

"She didn't punch you that hard, so stop complaining." Luce scolded Viper. The purple-haired kid pouted, while Luce kept her stern expression firmly in place.

"Why did you do that, anyway?" she had been trying to get his motive for causing the conflict out of him since the altercation nearly two hours ago. Finally, Viper gave in to her pleading.

"Fine. I'll tell you." He grumbled, not too happy he was telling this information to Luce. "Verde paid me." Luce didn't feel surprised at all and simply closed her eyes with a sigh. She was wondering when the green-haired psychopath would make an appearance. And it seemed his only 'research' for the night was going to be fucking with Colonnello and his first attempt at a real relationship.

"You're not very good at keeping secrets, Viper." Luce turned to see Verde leaning against the table the four of them sat at.

Luce was surprised to see him wearing proper attire for the event. Viper just stayed silent like a sullen child while Verde stared him down.

"Leave him alone, Verde. You're not doing anything useful by being here." Luce looked at him, holding back a glare while patting Viper on the head and then crossing her arms.

"I want those two to get together as much as you dolts do," Verde said, pulling shocked looks from all four who heard him, "But I needed to carry out a few experiments for my research before I let you guys set them up." he looked at Viper and his characteristic crazy scientist grin pulled up at the corners of his mouth.

"So you pissed Lal off?" Skull squeaked, not getting why that would have helped. He sunk back into his chair when Verde turned his crazy grin in the freshman's direction.

"Had to see how much she valued blondie's word." He looked at the sullen Colonnello and nodded, "Apparently not very much." Colonnello seemed to ignore the quip, and Verde continued on.

"The sexual tension between the two is frankly disgusting, and I want to see it put out a bit at the very least. However, I am _not_ going to pass up some research opportunities while you all force these two together." He paused, "You're a little hopeless, Colonnello. Not a very interesting test subject." He was disappointed in Colonnello's current listless stare.

Colonnello seemed to snap at that point, however, jumping from his seat and easily lifting Verde by the collar of his suit jacket as he brought the slightly shorter man to eye level.

"You quit your fucking experiments, and I'll quit thinking about separating your head from your shoulders with your tie." Something in Colonnello's voice made Verde's face pale and his grin wither and fall off his face. He nodded once, taking in a deep gulp of air once he had been set down He looked on with slightly shocked eyes as Colonnello resumed his depressed stare at the floor, slumped dejectedly once more in his chair.

Verde cleared his throat.

"I'll be going to the after party with you all. For now, I take my leave." Verde readjusted his tie and acted as if nothing had happened, turning abruptly and walking off.

Luce and the others had simply been shocked into silence.

Suddenly, Viper glanced at the time and his eyes widened.

"Gotta go, thanks Luce, I'll be back in time to go to the after party!" he jumped up and nearly vaulted over a few chairs to leave the room, leaving Luce shaking her head while she took his chair, finding herself wondering why in the world she hung out with these ridiculous people.

Another hour and a half passed and Reborn returned from the casino in time to see Viper and Fon walking into the dance room with two filled bags each in their hands. He grinned. _Now_ it was time to party.


	8. This Isn't School Appropriate

**A/N: Here's another chapteeer. There's a little bit of Skull abuse in here so M RATING AAA. Just kidding. But everyone is always mean to Skull. He gets no sympathy :')**

**ALSO IT IS NOT A PARTY UNLESS EVERYONE GETS TRASHED. Well. Maybe it is, but...shhhh. YOU ALL ROCK FOR GIVING ME REVIEWS AND I LOVE YOU SO HUGS AND COOKIES EVERYWHERE. **

**Also we'll pretend that these adults who allowed a bunch of high schoolers to have a party don't know that clearly this is not going to be a nice, sheltered little party. Or something. SCREW THE RULES OK. SCREW THEM.**

**'Nother short chapter and an awkward end, but if I didn't end it here it would be around 6000 words at the next good stopping point :T**

**And now I shall wrap this up, edit this chapter again and post it. SO ENJOY~ 3**

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"Have we got everyone?" Luce called, looking over the heads she saw congregated outside. The dance had finally ended and everyone was getting ready to get into the limo and head to the after party. It was a few blocks away at one of the most expensive hotels in the area - and it had a rooftop pool. All of them were excited to get going. Not to mention the fact they had four duffle bags filled with beer and other alcohol - but Reborn was keeping that between himself, Viper and Fon.

Luce nodded to herself as she ushered everyone into the limo, counting off her friends and their dates. Fon's date was the only one remaining; Colonnello's had decided to go home after he had given her about as much attention as he would give to his math homework. Why she expected antyhing different, Luce didn't know. He didn't seem affected by his date leaving so much as he was by Lal's complete and utter rejection. She flashed a charming smile at Colonnello as his still-glum face passed by hers, unable to help feeling bad for the poor guy.

She was the last to climb in, settling down next to Reborn and Lal. The girl seemed oddly cheerful, considering the night's events, but figured she had spoken with Reborn, and he had guilted her into feeling how she did right now. He was a bit of a manipulative bastard like that sometimes.

When they were on their way, Luce moved to the back of the limo with the other girls and announced that they were changing for the after party.

"If anybody so much as thinks of looking back there, I'll happily castrate you all." Lal chirped cheerfully, making even Reborn cringe a little. None of the boys doubted that she wouldn't.

"You boys can get ready there. But that doesn't mean you can swim in your boxers." Yuni added, making sure all five of the boys had turned their backs before letting the others know they could change.

The boys talked amongst themselves for a minute, with Skull muttering over and over again that he refused to swim, he didn't have a suit, and blah blah blah.

"_You_ can go naked for all we care. Just stop your whining." Viper muttered, tilting his head down and shoving the younger kid. Skull let loose a panicked squeak and called out for Lal and Luce, saying something along the lines of 'these guys are mean to meee!', drawing out the final syllable in a pathetic whine.

The older girls didn't hear, or if they did, they had no intention of letting the whiny freshman know. Instead, Luce continued to change and Lal lifted up what she thought was going to be a one piece suit. Instead she stared as the skimpy (by her standards) bikini bottom fell into her lap and she found herself holding the top half up.

"Um. Yuni? I don't own a bikini. This isn't mine." Lal choked out, picking up the bottoms and nearly biting her tongue off when her teeth clenched. Her friends were bitches and hos. What the hell possessed them to think she would wear this thing? It would barely cover her ass. So she said what was on her mind.

"This isn't even going to cover my ass, guys." The only responses she got were giggles and amused looks, while she grumbled and began to change into the suit anyway, knowing that she really had no choice in this matter. Over the suit she pulled on a button-down military-esque dress that Yuni had stuffed into her bag for Lal.

Lal sighed. How the hell had she even gotten dragged into this mess? Reborn owed her _big time_, and if he didn't pay her back somehow she was going to make his life miserable forever.

By the time all the girls had changed, the limo had arrived at the location of the after party. Reborn had had more than enough fun elbowing Colonnello in the side with each remark Lal made about her ass and the bathing suit she planned on wearing, while the blonde remained completely still, his shoulders tense and an intensely uncomfortable look on his face.

"Colonnello, move your ass, you're in the way." Viper growled, shoving the still-frozen kid and knocking him back into reality.

"R-right." He muttered, getting up to get out of the limo and successfully whacking his head while doing so. He swore and put a hand on the injury while muttering more curses and glaring daggers at the others as they laughed at him.

"Good going, _zipperhead_." Colonnello had to fight the urge to look over at the source of Lal's sneering voice. He simply exited the limo, dragging what was left of his dignity behind him as he left. Viper and Skull followed after him and the girls followed after last, Reborn giving the limo directions to pick them up in three hours.

He grinned. After this party was going to be the one that he, Fon and Viper had decided their group of friends would have at a nearby hotel. Of course, it was all in order to fix up the mess that was now Colonnello and Lal's relationship, but those two didn't need to know that. Luce had disapproved of the whole idea, mostly because of the alcohol that had been integrated into the plan. But after much pleading from Reborn, she had agreed that she, at the very least, would come. Her sister was going to go home, though.

Reborn had figured something like this was going to be necessary from the beginning, so he'd already told Lal's mother and Colonnello's parents that they would all be staying at his house after the party. Viper, Fon, Skull and Luce had done the same. If this didn't work...well, then, nothing was going to.

"C'mon, Reborn, don't just stand there!" Luce called out, snapping him from his thoughts and dragging him by the hand after the group of others who had already started into the building.

The boys went off to change out of their less-than-comfortable suits, while the girls were left to take in the atmosphere of the party. This one, of course, was not sponsored by their school – there was no way a pool party at the expensive hotel would have been approved, especially since it was easily seen that the martinis being handed out were anything but virgin. The only reason this had been pulled off was because the hotel was owned by the father of one of the kids in their grade. Lal was staring out into the mass of people in the area. They were sitting on the edge and swimming in the pool, sitting on and at tables scattered around the pool area and in the two spas that were in the far corner of the area. The bar was by far the most crowded area, with kids calling out for all sorts of alcoholic drinks.

Lal looked at Luce, who looked completely unsurprised by the scale of the party, while she announced that she was going to have Yuni go home on the limo then, much to the younger girl's disappointment.

"But, Luce, why can't I—" Yuni's protests were cut off when Luce set her stern 'mom stare' on her kid sister, putting an arm around her shoulders and directing her back the way they had come as calmly as if she had had this all planned to begin with. Actually, she probably had.

"I'll be back in a few minutes, don't wait for me!" Luce called cheerfully while Yuni crossed her arms and glared at the ground. Lal smiled and waved, looking up in time to see Reborn, Fon, Viper and Colonnello dragging a very reluctant looking Skull behind them and shoving one another and laughing about _something_.

That something became apparent when Skull was muscled to the front of the group, yelling at them to give him his clothes back. Lal's face split into a huge grin of amusement when she saw the poor skinny kid was clad in only a none-too-comfortable looking speedo. It took Lal a moment to realize that it wasn't a speedo, but just his _underwear_ that Skull had on. The other girls around her began to giggle as well at Skull's overreaction. When he tried to make a run for the bathrooms, Viper grabbed him by his hair and dragged him back, while Colonnello grinned and asked, "Hey, Skull, you can swim, right?"

Skull stopped struggling against Viper's hold and looked at Colonnello, confused until the blonde picked him up by his upper arms and then lifted him rather effortlessly. He turned around and dangled Skull over the edge of the pool, grinning as Skull began to struggle and yell complaints. All of this was cut off when he was doused in the water, coming to the surface yelling insults at Colonnello as the rest of the boys walked all the way over to the girls, cackling like the retards they were. Reborn looked disappointed when he didn't see Luce, and Lal grinned.

"She was just having Yuni go home, she'll be back." Lal told him, grinning even wider as he looked embarrassed and tried to wipe all the expression from his face.

"What are you guys standing around for?" Fon called, moving off from the group with his date, not waiting for them to catch up. He figured they would all move off to do their own thing anyway.

Reborn spotted Luce walking back and smiled, walking over to her and putting an arm around her waist and wandering off. Viper had gone off several minutes ago, and Lal found herself standing alone with Colonnello. The blonde was looking at her with a weird expression on his face that turned to hurt when she scowled and walked off without saying a word to him. Colonnello sighed and ran a hand through his hair, deciding that thanks to Viper, his chance with Lal was gone and he might as well enjoy the party as much as he could while he was there. It would be nearly impossible, with his current mood, but he supposed he would survive.

Lal had decided she would do the same, and located some of her other friends (who were surprised to see her at the party, no less wearing what she was). She and her friends went off to talk and enjoy themselves, while Colonnello had settled himself in one of the spas with several girls on either side of him. Maybe he _would_ have an okay time after all.

Reborn and Luce were seated at the bar, neither drinking considering what was planned for later. Instead, the two were leaned in close as they talked about something, Luce looking radiant with a grin on her lips, and Reborn looking no different, though he managed to keep his elation contained within a small smile. Fon and his date were enjoying themselves in the pool, Fon showing off a bit by tossing her around as if she weighed nothing at all. Skull was sulking on the edge of the pool and yelped when Viper pushed him in, screaming curses at the other as he ran off, cackling like a maniac.

Eventually, Lal found herself dragged to the spa by one of her friends once one had nearly emptied. It seemed the rest of her friends had the same idea and was squished between two guys she didn't really know all that well as they all crowded into the bubbling water. She didn't mind being in there, really, until she leaned back and accidentally leaned into the person sitting in the spa next to theirs. She turned to mutter an apology, but the moment she noticed the blonde hair and bright blue eyes of the guy she was going to apologize to she changed her mind.

Instead of an apology, Lal said a very snarky, "Excuse _you_."

And then she turned back to her friends and jumped right into their conversation. Colonnello's mouth dropped open in surprise at Lal's response.

"You might want to get out of the water, heat's bad for a burn." Reborn's voice made Colonnello frown, and he glared at the Mafioso as he slid into the water. Luce joined him soon after, and Reborn pulled her close to him with an arm around her shoulders.

"Fuck you, man." Colonnello muttered, sinking down into the water so it came up to just below his nose. Luce laughed.

"Come on, Colonnello. Just enjoy yourself, don't worry about that." She said cheerily, looking up as someone else stepped into the water. She smiled and lifted a hand in a wave when she noticed it was Lal. Reborn looked behind her and grinned when he saw Viper and Skull standing nearby. Viper had a pleased grin on his face, while Skull just looked completely miserable.

"Hi, Luce," Lal said stiffly, looking anything but happy to be where she was. Reborn simply chuckled at her obvious discomfort.

Colonnello honestly wanted to sink completely under the water to avoid a confrontation with Lal. Viper, Reborn and even Skull and Luce were waiting eagerly to see how the situation would unfold. Viper had agreed to shove his two unwilling friends together as many times as possible that night, and now was not the first time he'd tried that evening. He was just as eager as the others to see the outcome - but he wanted Lal to beat the crap out of Colonnello, as opposed to fuck the crap out of him later on.

However, none of them ever got the chance to see how Lal and Colonnello would react after the night's previous happenings. Lal noticed where Colonnello's eyes were directed, thanks to the god damn bathing suit she was wearing and prepared to beat the shit out of him. She paused as something seemed to catch the attention of all the boys, though. She heard giggles and the sound of running feet behind her and turned in time to see completely nude girls running through the crowd of people. She assumed it was a part of some drunken bet, and she used the distraction as a way out of this uncomfortable situation.

By the time Viper, Reborn, Skull and Colonnello had gathered their wits and picked their jaws up from the floor, Lal had managed to escape to _somewhere_, and none of them really wanted to go find her. Luce looked a little bit annoyed by Reborn and the other boys' reactions and stated simply that she was going to go find Lal and hang out with her for the rest of the evening.

She wasn't really sure if anyone even noticed she had left.


	9. Stupid Little Rivalry

**A/N: I'm glad that I plan to heavily edit this later, because the wording in 50% of this entire fic really needs to be fixed. **

**Besides much awkward wording, I like how this chapter went. Maybe I rushed a few things and the flow isn't quite there, but I'm happy with how it turned out. **

**I don't have a whole lot else to say, besides a thank you to JohhnyB/Boyudo for your reviews :D**

**Now enjoy this chapter~! Remember, I love reviews!**

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"Luce! Lal!" Skull called into the girl's changing rooms, moving away from the entrance quickly when he heard Luce call back that they were almost ready. The boys had gotten changed and were ready to leave half an hour ago, but none of them dared complain about the time it was taking the girls to do the same. All of them feared the wrath of Lal.

When the girls finally came out—Lal in her brown button-down and Luce in a pair of shorts and a lacrosse jersey—Reborn called the limo to take them to their hotel. Luce had informed Lal of the plans while they were changing, and her friend had, of course, overreacted. But it was no matter now since Luce had guilted Lal into going. After listing off all the injuries Lal had inflicted on Colonnello that night, and reminding her that he had been nothing but nice to her the entire night.

Luce also may have let it slip that he really did like her quite a bit, which only made Lal feel even guiltier.

She sat in a sulky silence the whole way to the hotel. At this point, Colonnello was the only person in their group unaware of the situation, and he remained that way until they stopped at the hotel and everyone was let out.

"Hey, Reborn, why are we here?" He asked, glancing at Viper and Fon as they held the four bags filled with who-knew-what.

"Oh, I didn't tell you?" Reborn said, sounding only mildly concerned. Colonnello gave him an unimpressed look, muttering a few not-so-nice things under his breath before Reborn responded.

"We're all staying here for the night, just to have a little party of our own." He paused and gestured to the bags Fon and Viper held, "Fon and Viper snagged some drinks for us from the casino while the dance was still going on." Colonnello stared at Reborn in disbelief, not too sure what to say in response. He just tagged along after his friend, as the others did, and walked into the lobby of the hotel while Luce talked to the boy at the front desk and got the keys to their room. They all stood in the lobby of the hotel, Colonnello sulking while the others talked amongst themselves, until Skull's voice pierced through everyone's conversation.

"Verde?" Skull's exclamation drew the attention of all but Luce, and they all held varying levels of annoyance and surprise on their faces when they noticed their green-haired, glasses-wearing classmate walking toward them.

"Did you all think you were going to get rid of me that easily?" Verde chuckled. He now wore his typical clothing – a pair of black pants, a green dress shirt and a white tie—as opposed to the suit he wore to the dance earlier.

"Verde." Reborn muttered, staring at the smirking bastard as he walked up to their group.

"I'm staying with you hopeless retards. Just thought I'd give you advance warning." Lal fought the urge to go up to the cocky bastard and make him regret even coming to this place, but Reborn's shrug and response stopped her.

"Whatever." He stated simply, turning to take a room key from Luce as she headed back over to the group.

"Hi, Verde." She said, the tone of her voice hard to read. She didn't seem upset to see him there, so the rest of the group relaxed somewhat. None of them were happy in the least, however.

"Come on you lot, let's go to the room." Reborn put his arm around Luce's waist and walked toward the elevator, holding the door open for everyone as they all piled into the elevator as well. Lal found herself pushed up against Colonnello due to the tiny size of the elevator, and it was much to her dismay that she was unable to decide how she felt about the situation.

She caught the sidelong glance Reborn sent her way, and managed a frown in his direction before he looked away.

The ding of the elevator as it reached their floor brought Lal's attention to getting the _fuck _out of the tiny space. She normally wouldn't have minded it if she wasn't quite so aware that Colonnello was _right behind her_. Like, full body-to-body contact.

Colonnello was finally able to _breathe_ once Lal had stepped away from him, glad that she hadn't decided that it was his fault the elevator was so tiny and elbowed him in the crotch or something.

Once they had made it to their room, Reborn opened the door – and he was honestly surprised at the size of it. He walked inside and heard the surprised approval of the others as well, all of them taking in the suite.

In front of them was a large room with two couches and a massive flat screen TV, along with a kitchen off to the right corner of the room. Leading from the big center room were two smaller rooms. One held a king-sized bed, while the other was much smaller with another pull-out couch and a smaller TV. Even Lal sounded happy when she so helpfully exclaimed that the hotel room was _huge_.

Fon and Viper set the bags of alcohol on the two coffee tables in front of the couches, Viper grabbing one and opening it with a grin. When nobody else moved, he shook it and his smile dropped a bit.

"What, aren't you all going to have some too?"

Fon was the second to take some, and then Lal stepped forward with a grin growing on her face.

"I bet I can drink you all into a coma." She announced haughtily. Reborn laughed.

"Challenge accepted." He replied, pulling out a large bottle of vodka and ordering Skull to find something to use for shot glasses.

"When you lose, you have to share a bed with Colonnello when we go to sleep tonight!" He said. Lal was unfazed, because she was so convinced that she would win. Colonnello looked, admittedly, very nervous.

"Good thing I won't lose, Spiffy!" Lal shot back, "And if you lose, you know what _you'll_ have to do." And Reborn did. But he didn't let _his_ nervousness show. He just slammed the vodka on the table and poured their first round of shots.

"Get ready to have your ass kicked, Lalu." Lal and Reborn downed the first round without hesitation, while Verde lifted his lip at their enthusiasm.

"Don't look like that, _you_ didn't have to be here." Viper muttered, shoving a beer into the green-haired kid's chest and directing him to one of the couches.

"You wanted to observe? Well then observe. You still owe me, by the way." Viper sat down next to the slightly grumpy scientist to watch the show, shaking his head as Reborn and Lal downed their third round of shots.

This could only end up badly.

"Ooookay you two, I think that's enough." Luce pulled the bottle of Vodka from Lal's hand.

"H-hey, tha…tha's mine!" The raven-haired girl exclaimed, struggling feebly against Luce's pull for the drink before she finally let go of the bottle.

"Haaaaaaaahhhh I wiiiiiinnn." Reborn gloated, throwing his now-missing shirt at Lal's face. Lal yelled fuck unnecessarily loudly and Luce sighed.

"These two…" She managed a laugh as Lal started to go off on Reborn about something or other, her words slurring together into something unintelligible as she attempted to speak quickly. She took a quick survey of the room and smiled when she spotted Verde pitched over, with his forehead on the coffee table and one hand clutching a nearly empty beer. She lifted his head slightly to remove his glasses, folding them up and leaving them beside his head. Colonnello had gone off _somewhere_, but Luce had no idea where. He would be back, she figured.

"Laaaaal stop!" Skull's voice made Luce turn, and she stood completely still as she took in the scene before deciding that this was way more trouble than she was willing to deal with.

Lal was standing now, looking anything but steady on her feet. Reborn had sprawled himself out on the free couch, a cocky grin splayed across his obviously drunken face.

"I wooon and'ya knowwww iiiittt." He slurred, while Lal glared at him. She must have picked up a bottle of beer for herself when Luce wasn't paying attention.

"F-fuck you, asswipe." Lal replied, the vodka she'd drunk earlier making her speech hilariously unsteady.

"Guess'wha, Lalooooooo." Reborn called. Lal threw her empty bottle at his face in reply.

"'M sexier than youuuuuuuu." The throw was clearly off, and the bottle landed on the ground with a few clinks while Lal processed what Reborn had just said.

Reborn just laid there, the cocky grin still in place, waiting to see how Lal would respond.

"_Oh yeah?_" She exclaimed, "Well I have _tits_!" Upon saying this, Lal proceeded to rip open the front of her button-down dress. And that was when Luce decided it was time for all of them to put the alcohol away and go to bed.

Skull was trying to keep Lal from attacking Reborn, while Viper stood in front of her, making good use of his phone with a grin on his face.

"Viper!" Luce barked, making the purple-haired male jump and turn slowly to face her.

"Y-yes, Luce?" He said nervously. He knew that stern tone of voice well.

"Delete those pictures, or else I'll tell Lal you took them tomorrow." That was enough to make Viper delete the pictures immediately. Lal was scary, and there was no getting around that.

Luce let out a sigh and walked over to Lal, re-buttoning her clothes and directing her to the bed to sleep. When she glanced over at Reborn, she couldn't help but smile. He'd passed out where he lay on the couch.

"C'mon, Lal, I think it's time for bed…" Luce soothed her still agitated friend. Lal let herself be directed to the only bed in the hotel room, muttering about stupid cheaters and spike-heads. Luce assumed her drunken friend was referring to Reborn's somewhat insane hair.

Once Luce had successfully gotten Lal into the bed (Lal had insisted the room was too warm and stripped out of her dress, throwing it at Luce's head as she was leaving), she decided it was time to make sure the rest of their dysfunctional little group of friends wasn't acting too irrationally.

Skull was standing up and looking very unsteady when Luce walked up to him. She put her hands on his shoulders and had to call his name a few times before he finally responded.

She moved him out of the way and onto the floor, telling him that it was time to go to bed. The freshman mumbled something unintelligible in response and let Luce settle him down with a pillow from the couch and a blanket. Although he hadn't had much to drink, Skull was still young and inexperienced when it came to the fun things their crazy group got into.

Fon had fallen asleep at the other couch, still sitting up. As Luce got closer, she heard soft snores coming from the martial arts addict. Luce decided that he looked comfortable enough, and left him as he was. She was about to go search for Colonnello when something else distracted her.

"Luce…" Viper's groaning voice caught the girl's attention. She turned and saw him on the floor in the kitchen with his head in the rather small trashcan.

"Viper, what did you do?" She asked, kneeling beside the pathetic-looking boy.

"I don' feel nice…" He looked up at her and she took pity on the poor dolt, helping him to his feet and giving him a similar treatment that she had given to the others.

Once Viper had been settled down with a spare trash can near him just in case, Luce remembered that she had been going to look for Colonnello. She sighed. Where the hell had that angsty bundle of depression gone?

She got her answer when she went to check the bedroom.

"Colonnello?" she called softly, about to open the door to confirm that he was in the room. But she paused when she heard voices, taking only a moment to recognize them.

She couldn't bring herself to interrupt them. Neither could do any damage to the other while this hammered. Maybe they might even be able to fix what Viper and Verde had ruined earlier that night.

With that hope in mind, Luce walked away from the door, trying to decide where she would sleep. She stood by the couch, barely suppressing a yelp of surprise as she was dragged down into a sitting position.

"Th' couch's room." Reborn's half asleep, slurred voice came to Luce's ears. Luce sighed, attempting to get up but failing miserably as the young Mafioso held her firmly in place.

"Sleep'ere!" Reborn pleaded, the whining tone to his voice frankly adorable to Luce. She shook her head, but smiled and gave in, laying down and allowing Reborn to tug her close to himself.

"Thank'ya." He mumbled, already falling back into sleep. Luce smiled, putting her hands over his as they held her tight. She may have been oblivious to it before, but it was clear to her now how the suit-wearing eighteen year old felt.

And it was clear to her how she felt, as well.

Colonnello had just about drunk himself into a coma by the time he had mustered up the nerve to go talk to Lal. He had returned to the room and walked in when Reborn and Lal were having their bare-chested showdown, a little dumbfounded when he took in the sight of Lal pulling the front of her dress open. He did his best to look away from her chest, but like hell was that even possible.

Luckily, he went unnoticed while Luce tended to Lal. And as soon as Luce had gone off to take care of the others, Colonnello slipped into the bedroom with Lal, dropping into the bed she was curled up in and falling backwards to lay down beside her.

"Who'sit." Lal mumbled, rolling over to find herself face to face with Colonnello. Normally, she would have scrambled up, given him a sound punch to the nose and then run away. But she was drunk. So she simply stared at him with a neutral expression while a smile spread across his.

"Hi Lal." Colonnello said dumbly, doing his best to keep his words from slurring.

"Go'way." Lal mumbled in response, meaning to roll so her back was to the blonde but ending up stuck laying on her back.

"Nope." Colonnello said, every bit the stubborn asshole.

"Fine. Wha'd'ya want?" Her receptive answer startled Colonnello, but he answered quickly.

"To talk to ya." He replied.

"Why." Lal's short sentences made Colonnello frown.

"'Cause I like you." Lal rolled onto her side to face him again, this time it was her turn to be surprised.

"Huh?"

"U-uh, 'cause I like to talk t'you." Colonnello covered up his blunder and grinned.

"Tha's not what'cha said." Lal protested, squinting at him and staring until his grin dropped and he lost his nerve. Even drunk Lal was intimidating.

"Doesn't matter." Colonnello muttered. Lal smacked him and he twitched, giving her an odd look.

"Tha fuck was that for?" He growled, glaring until he saw the grin that Lal now had on her face. Determined as he was to get rid of it, Colonnello rolled over so he was quite literally on top of her. Lal made a sound that resembled a squeal and attempted to shove him off.

"Get off'a me, ya fatass." She demanded, landing drunken blows on his shoulders. She found herself breathing a sigh of relief when the blonde moved, only to let out another yell of surprise when she was, this time, dragged on top of him.

"What're you doiiing." Lal whined, unable to hide the blush that crept up on her face.

"Huggin' you." Colonnello replied dumbly, grinning as her blush deepened.

"Leggo!" She demanded, struggling against his hold for a few moments before finally giving up and muttering that he was an insufferably _dick_.

"But'cha liiiikkeee meeeee." Colonnello practically giggled in his drunken stupor, while Lal shrugged and said something she never would have if she were sober.

"I kinda' do."

Both Colonnello and Lal were surprised when she said that, and they stared at one another for a few seconds before Colonnello managed to ask, "I-is tha'true?" Lal considered lying. But at this point she was too wasted to care what she said or if either of them remembered it – she simply nodded. The silence that followed confused both parties, but it didn't last long.

What happened after that neither Lal nor Colonnello could remember clearly. But fuck if either of them cared. Colonnello vaguely remembered a happy feeling, a happier feeling than he had felt in a very long time. And Lal was almost 100% certain that she remembered the exact moment that she put her lips on the stupid blonde army brat's, and how much she realized their stupid little rivalry was just that. Stupid. And she realized then something that she felt she had known from the beginning.

That stupid little rivalry? It didn't matter at all.


	10. Interruption

**A/N: I realize now how the last chapter kinda seems like the end of the story...but it's not! You guys get two more chapters. This one is a little goofy, but I had a lot of fun writing it. It's nice to make Lal super-embarrassed, because it's so _unlike_ her. **

**Anyway, thank you so much for the reviews guys! I really appreciate it (: You're all wonderful~**

**And since I'll be gone this whole weekend, leaving in a few minutes, I'll upload the last two chapters right now.**

**Anyway, read, review, and enjoy!**

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Lal woke to a grinding headache and a bone-dry mouth feeling, in general, like she had been run over several times by a bus. What confused her the most was how _naked_ she felt. And that she was pretty sure she felt another body pressed up against her back, and an arm curled around her middle, holding her rather protectively. She lay completely still for several seconds, trying to sort out the pain that radiated from her hangover-wrecked body and the weird warm and tingly feelings she was getting from every place that touched the skin of this _other person_ who was in the same bed as her, as well as trying to decide what the hell was even going on outside the confines of her head.

When she tried to reflect on the way the previous night had gone, she drew up a lot of blanks. After laying down and reflecting for what felt like four hours, Lal decided that the massive hangover was due to a drinking contest with Reborn (she had absolutely no idea who had won), and that she had obviously somehow made her way into this bed (she assumed Luce had something to do with it, what with her extreme motherly instincts).

When she focused on what was going on around her, instead of her grayed out memories and the pain in her head and throat, Lal heard soft snoring and felt the breath of whoever was in the bed with her on her neck. All of a sudden, she got a quick flash of memory that left her with a blush so deep, she was certain even her chest was bright red. Desperate to confirm the memory, Lal struggled to remove the grip of the person in bed with her, only to fail in that endeavor and succeed in waking the person up.

The arm tightened around her middle and drew her closer, while mumbled words reached Lal's ears.

"Where're ya goin'…" Lal's blush only deepened when she recognized the voice and that _little_ memory was confirmed.

"C-colonn-nello?" Lal choked out, keeping her eyes forward and not able to scratch up the nerve and look down at her chest to confirm that nothing to cover it was there. At all.

"Mm?" He brought his head so that his breath came hot and heavy on the back of Lal's neck, making her anything but uncomfortable – and not being uncomfortable by the proximity of the _stupid_ zipperhead made her uncomfortable.

"Wh…what are you…doing here?" She fought to keep her voice steady – not because of anger or discomfort, but because dear_ god_ he was so _close_ to her. And she honestly had zero idea how clothed he was. She knew that currently she was bare-chested and only lucky enough to still have her underwear on. What the hell had even _happened_ last night? How drunk had she _been_?

"I'as sleepin' a minute ago." The blonde replied, finally opening his eyes and then groaning in protest as the light from the window nearly blinded him. And then his eyes shot open and he realized who he was snuggled up all cozy against.

"O-oh. L-lal." He managed to say, while Lal was confused by the sudden change in his tone.

"Yes?" She responded, praying that her flame-red skin would return to its normal color sometime before Colonnello noticed it.

"Hi." Came the dumb reply. Lal almost smiled. Almost.

"Can you let me go?" She asked patiently, amazed at herself and her ability to refrain from going in for the kill.

"Yeah. Yeah, yeah sure!" Colonnello withdrew his arm from its protective grip around her, sitting up and putting a hand to his forehead as he groaned in pain, instantly regretting the quick movment. Or, really, moving at all.

Lal sat up without thinking and had a similar reaction, muttering curse words into her hands as she pressed the heels of them into her eye sockets. When she finally looked up, she noticed Colonnello gaping at her and as soon as she realized why, she whipped the sheet of the bed to cover her from the chin down. Once again, her skin flared an embarrassing red and she found herself unable to speak.

Colonnello laughed nervously.

"What the hell happened last night?" He spoke what both him and Lal were wondering.

"I don't know, but I need clothes and a really cold shower." Lal replied, using the sheet as a cover up while she moved to get off the bed and claim the shower for herself. She stopped when she felt a tug, turning to look at Colonnello with a half-assed glare.

"U-uh, how about you just um. Give me a second." He said, a nervous grin sliding onto his face as he held the sheet tightly in his lap. Realization hit Lal and she turned an even darker shade of red while nodding enthusiastically and saying he should take care of that _right now_. Colonnello jumped up and ran butt naked to find his boxers where they hung, clearly flung across the room. Lal had told herself she wasn't going to look, but she couldn't tear her eyes off the _stupid, stupid, stupid_ boy as he hurriedly pulled the boxers up over that fine, _fine _ass—

"Lal?" It was Colonnello's turn to notice Lal's stare, and that infuriatingly charming cocky grin of his spread across his face.

"You were _looking_." Lal shook her head vigorously, clutching the sheet to her chest and finding it hard to articulate.

"You so were. Don't lie!" Colonnello crowed, grinning like he'd just won the lottery.

"F-fine, I was! What of it?" Lal retorted feebly, looking desperately for her own clothes. Why the hell had she even taken them off to begin with? And how the _hell_ had she ended up in the same bed as Colonnello? And what the _fuck_ was up with those weird snippets of memory she had?

_Either that was some weirdo drunken fantasy,_ Lal thought, turning red once more, _or I was sucking some serious face with zipperhead._

"Lal?" Colonnello called uncertainly. She had a weird, somewhat pleased look on her face and it was honestly scaring Colonnello.

"What?" Lal asked, attempting to sort out all her feelings amidst the pain in her _throbbing_ head and the intense confusion that clouded most of her memory.

"Something wrong?" Colonnello asked cautiously, unsure of how she was going to react to him anymore. She was so damn confusing lately.

"U-uh, beside the fact that I don't really remember much of last night…nope!" Colonnello now understood the blush that had dominated her entire face, neck and even chest and shoulders since he'd woken up. Because he'd gotten some really radical memories himself that he was glad to have remembered. Of course he would never tell Lal that, because despite his normally aloof attitude about her hate toward him, he _did_ value his manly parts.

"You remember…parts, though, right?" Colonnello prodded, pausing before he took a massive leap of faith and blurted, "Like kissing and—"

"_Yes_. Please don't elaborate." Her blush had gone down, but once again it flared as she wondered what Colonnello remembered that she didn't.

"We didn't—"

"No! God, no. No, no we didn't." Colonnello cut her off, because he knew what she was going to ask. Even in his drunken stupor he would have remembered _that_. And he knew that no matter how hammered either of them got, the possibility of sex from either end was about negative fifty thousand.

Lal looked relieved, and her shoulders relaxed slightly.

"Good." She breathed. Because it wasn't that she would have necessarily _hated_ the idea, but that she would never, _ever_ in her entire life hear the end of this night if anyone found out. Ever. _Ever_.

There was an awkward pause while Lal attempted once more to calm herself down and Colonnello prayed to god his body wouldn't decide to give him a boner right then. Because for some reason, Lal was standing in front of him in nothing but her underwear and a sheet, and he had made out heavily with her and both of them remembered it and _he was still alive_.

"I should take a shower—"

"I need to clean up a little—"

The two spoke at the same time, stopping and looking mighty awkward as they tried to decide what to do. It was still early, but not early enough and soon the others would be waking up and wanting to get the fuck back to their own houses so they could nurse their respective hangovers. Not to mention the fact they had to vacate their hotel room by _ten_. Which was in half an hour.

"You go ahead, I can just take one once I'm home." Lal said, while Colonnello shook his head.

"Your mom's strict. If she sees you coming home like you are now, you're probably dead." How he knew that Lal had no idea, but it was true.

"Yeah well your parents are in the military, so the same goes for your end." Colonnello sighed. That much was true. The idea that came to his head next, for some reason or another, seemed wonderful and he didn't bother to think about the consequences of voicing it until after the deed was done.

"We could take one together, it'll save time." He said, flinching violently immediately after. Lal's expression changed, but she didn't attack him like he imagined he would. She looked a little horrified at the thought, then much less so, and then she turned that bright red color that Colonnello was finding to be more and more adorable each time it happened.

"N-n-no I can't, that's—no, that just…" Lal found speech impossible, until Colonnello shook his head, deciding to clarify.

"We—we have bathing suits! Don't worry, I'm…I'm not that crazy." He tacked on nervous laughter at the end of his clarification, and was relieved to see Lal relax and sigh.

"Fine. Fine. Go get your suit and mine and I'll…I don't know. Go start the shower." Lal said, not too sure what her emotions were currently doing. Colonnello nodded and walked off in search of the swimming attire, while Lal dropped the sheet and ran for the bathroom that connected to the bedroom. Why the hell was this hotel room so expensive? It was huge, but really god damned ill-equipped.

She was grateful that the shower at the very least, was so big.

Colonnello returned wearing his still-damp suit from the night before, handing Lal hers and waiting for her to change. She waved him in, reaching over to turn the shower on and then sticking her hand in the flow of water to test the temperature. It was really cold, like someone had forgotten to turn the hot water heater on. A slightly evil idea came to her mind.

"Alright, it feels good." She said, although the water was still freezing. Colonnello nodded and stepped under the water when she made no move to, eyes widening in shock and a rather high-pitched yell clawing its way out of his throat. Lal was nearly bent over double laughing when he scrambled to the corner of the shower to escape the frozen flow.

"Not. _Funny_." He hissed at her through gritted teeth, while he rubbed his arms to fight off the goose bumps that rose on his body.

"No, it's _hilarious_." Lal corrected him, checking the water once more before she dared step foot inside. Colonnello glared like a sullen child at her while she wet her hair and then flashed a cheerful and extremely rare grin at him.

But he couldn't stay mad for long. Lal used up a good three fourths of the tiny shampoo bottle and tossed it at him, flashing another rare grin as he made an incredulous face at the amount she had left him.

Those grins were becoming less and less uncommon the more time he spent with Lal.

He sighed and spent a good minute getting every last drop of the soap onto his hand, demanding use of the water to wet his hair and then soap away the gross. He was lost in his own little world, staring at his feet while deep in thought while he scrubbed away at his hair, looking up only when Lal called his name. He couldn't help but grin at the ridiculous hairstyle she had given herself with the insane amount of soap that was now in her hair.

"Very attractive. Wear it like that all the time." He chuckled, joining in and giving himself a super-pointy mohawk. The giggle he got in response nearly made him fall over from shock.

The two proceeded to make crazy hairstyles and throw soap at one another, until Lal said that they were taking longer than they had time for to clean up. She moved to stand under the shower spray, but Colonnello got a rather devious idea and told her he would help. He removed the showerhead, glad it was one of the detachable types, and started to rinse out Lal's hair.

In order to exact his revenge, he quickly turned the shower to its coldest setting. Lal's reaction was somewhat delayed, but the screech he managed to get out of her had him quite literally rolling on the ground in laughter. She shouted curses at him and took little time to retaliate, grabbing the discarded showerhead and directing the spray at him, making him flail around helplessly in an attempt to get away from the cold.

Suddenly, he found himself pinned to the ground as Lal sat on his chest and sprayed the water into his face, bearing her full weight down on his arms as he tried to get her away.

Neither Colonnllo nor Lal noticed that they had gathered quite the audience, due to their yelling and immature antics.

When Reborn cleared his throat rather noisily, Lal actually stopped mid laugh and Colonnello's resistance against Lal's arms disappeared. Lal quickly found herself laying down on top of Colonnello, both of the noisy high schoolers looking absolutely dumbfounded as their friends grinned from ear to god damn ear at them from across the room.

"Having fun, guys?" Fon asked, not a single hint of mocking tone in his voice. But Lal and Colonnello knew that was what he was feeling. They were just both too mortified to even think at the moment.

"I think we've interrupted some sort of mating ritual." Verde pitched in, while Lal, for the millionth time in the past hour, turned a bright, hot red from forehead to chest. Colonnello was just _so confused_ and completely mortified – and unable to think enough to react to the situation at hand.

"Do you think we should just leave them to finish?" Viper questioned, while Reborn laughed.

"Nah. You two don't mind if we watch, right?" Luce smacked him, although it was clear that she was highly amused by the whole situation from the huge grin that dominated her soft face.

"I don't really think I want to watch them do _anything_." Skull looked a little disturbed by the thought, and Luce jokingly hid his eyes.

It was now that Lal decided she could move again, and she had jumped up and run after the six that stood there, mocking and making fun of her and Colonnllo. Skull and Viper were the first to scramble out the door, while Fon, Verde, Reborn and Luce followed quickly after. Lal leaned out the doorway, screaming after them that she was going to make them eat their own asses when she was done with them before slamming the bathroom door hard enough to even make Colonnello flinch.

Seconds later, both Lal and Colonnello broke into stomach-bursting laughter.

When they could breathe again, they finished their shower with little incident, Colonnello combed out Lal's hair and they dried off. Lal found her clothes, put them on, and Colonnello did the same – and when they came out to see their friends, they acted as if nothing at all had happened.

Because after that embarrassing event, the two already knew what to do to deal with the situation, turning it much to their advantage.


	11. Glad You Went

**A/N: Annnd the last chapter! I hope you all liked the story! Some nice closure to this thing, I think. I don't have much more to say here, really.**

**Just, thank you everyone for your reviews and everything! You're all super duper epicly awesome people :D**

**With that, I bid you adieu, until the next story!**

**Read, review and enjoy!**

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The final two weeks of school passed in no different a manner than they had before the two days of prom.

Meaning, Lal and Colonnello left their friends dumbfounded as they returned to their usual interactions. Colonnello continually managed to make Lal angry, and Lal continually used Colonnello as a human punching bag. Even Luce was at a loss as to what the hell had gone wrong – and she was pretty much a psychic.

But if their friends had paid closer enough attention, they would notice that beneath the 'anger' Lal displayed was a playfulness that Colonnello mirrored as he bugged and teased her. And for some _mysterious_ reason, both Lal and Colonnello disappeared at the same time every day, for roughly the same amount of time.

The second oddity went more unnoticed because the two of them disappearing during their free periods at school was nothing new. The fact that the two were always seen together directly after that time, in the same hallway by the gym was what caused Reborn to finally guess something was up.

But he said nothing, sticking to speculation only while he watched the interactions of the two so-called enemies. The only other person who knew what he thought he did was Luce. He didn't trust any of the others to keep quiet – not even Fon.

Graduation was getting closer, and both Lal and Colonnello believed that they had gotten away with their "I still hate you so much" charade. Colonnello had announced that he was being forced into attending college prior to enlisting in the army, but refused to say where. Lal knew, though. And his destination made her more than happy to continue to hide their growing relationship.

While it wasn't _completely_ necessary to be so secretive, sneaking around behind the backs of their friends was much easier than having to endure the endless teasing, lewd comments and probable cockblock attempts by Reborn.

Things were just so much simpler when nobody knew how fake their public interactions truly were.

Lal sat in her car while she headed to graduation, taking her own car so she could have at least a little peace and quiet for the day. After this ceremony would be party, party, party thanks to her mother.

With a smile, Lal moved her thoughts to other, more important things. Such as the conversation she and Colonnello had had after the shower incident weeks ago.

"Well...they know now." She had muttered while he untangled her now slightly less disgusting hair.

"Maybe." Colonnello had replied, a grin on his face. Lal saw it in the mirror in front of her and frowned.

"Maybe?" How was there anything 'maybe' about this situation?

"We might still be able to convince them we're drunk." Colonnello's 'bright idea' made Lal sigh.

"Do you _really_ think that'll work?" she sure as hell didn't.

Colonnello shrugged.

"Who knows? It's worth a shot." He replied. It _was_ their only real idea to remedy the situation. Their serious conversation had ended there - what followed made Lal grin at the memories.

"Hey, why are you so good at fixing my hair, anyway?" Lal had asked. "Are you secretly a hairdresser?" She grinned at the thought, giving Colonnello no time to respond, "You so are. Don't deny it." There was a pause as Colonnello leaned on the bathroom counter next to her, looking incredibly unimpressed.

"Remember how I had my hair long in seventh grade?" He asked. Lal grimaced. She had made fun of him mercilessly for it for the longest time.

"Eeeexactly." He laughed. Lal's expression had been enough to tell Colonnello what she was thinking of.

Lal pulled into the student parking lot of her school, the memory coming to an end. She stepped from her car and waved to a few friends, about to walk over to them to go gather where they were going to receive their caps and gowns when she felt hands at her waist. Suddenly, she was spun and lifted off the ground enough to be kissed quickly.

Lal was too surprised to react for a few seconds, so Colonnello leaned down and stole another kiss, grinning as Lal smacked his shoulder afterward.

"Everyone can _see us_ you know!" She hissed, glancing around and then relaxing only when she was sure no one could see the two of them talking.

"It's graduation, we'll only see them a little over the summer. Don't forget the physical training we have to do for West Point." Colonnello reminded her. Lal shrugged.

"Yeah, yeah," Lal replied, waving her hand dismissively. "Besides, I got plenty of physical training in the gym with you." Lal grinned as a subtle blush that crept across Colonnello's face.

"Aw, did I embarrass you?" She laughed, reaching up and patting his cheek affectionately before she turned and began to walk off, waving at the still flustered Colonnello over her shoulder. Colonnello shook his head and forcibly removed those memories from his head for the moment, waiting a few moments before following after Lal. He hoped that someone would join him so he wasn't left with just the thoughts inside his head.

Graduation came and went without incident, and there was a short time after all of the formal ceremonies where the senior class wandered aimlessly around the school's green, talking amongst themselves and their friends and family. Reborn was having a conversation with Luce's parents, while Luce was off talking with some of her friends. He looked up when he heard his name being called, smiling at Luce's parents one last time and wrapping up their conversation before going to join Fon, Viper and Luce.

"Have you seen Colonnello or Lal?" Fon asked, while Luce waved Yuni and Skull over.

"No…I actually haven't. Why?" Reborn replied while giving Skull a good-natured punch in the shoulder.

"Ow! What the hell?" Skull whined, "Luuuucee!" He added looking at the older girl for support. Luce just shook her head at them.

"Lal's mom wants a picture with all of us…" Viper didn't seem too thrilled by the idea. Nor did he seem too thrilled by graduation, either.

"Lal could be with her other friends. I'll go look for them." Luce volunteered, walking off and disappearing in the sea of green and white graduation gowns, the number dwindling as kids took them off and returned them. Reborn tuned out the conversation Fon and Viper were having about the location of their two friends, thinking back to the weird way the two had been acting the past two weeks.

He found himself thinking of the numerous times that Lal and Colonnello had been found outside the hallway by the gym, always looking a little bit flushed and untidy. At first he thought that the two had been using the free period to do a little training – it was a well known fact that they were both going to pursue military careers.

But it was then that Reborn decided he knew where the two were.

"Fon, Viper, I know where they are." He said, interrupting their arguing.

"What?" Viper asked, while Skull and Yuni looked interested, since Reborn seemed so certain.

"Come on, follow me." He said, adding afterward, "Yuni, Skull, you find Luce and tell her to come to the Gym hallway. You two can stay here." He smiled when Yuni looked pouty, patting her on the head.

"This is something you probably _don't_ need to see, sweetheart." He chuckled, and then walked off.

Luce joined their small group outside the entrance to the equipment room portion of the gymnasium, opening her mouth to ask why they were _there_. But Reborn put a finger to his lips and then grinned, looking a little bit evil as he did so.

Now that Luce was here, he proceeded to quietly open the door to the room, feeling only a _tiny_ bit skeevy when his theory was proven correct, and he saw Colonnello and Lal doing some serious face-sucking.

He almost let out a yelp when Luce punched him in the fucking _spine_, not taking the time to glare at her – because he was too busy thinking of the perfect time to interrupt these two. He found his moment when Colonnello lifted Lal onto a desk pushed up against the wall. He leaned casually against the doorframe and noisily cleared his throat watching the reactions of his two friends with amusement.

Fon and Viper were having a hard time holding in laughter as Colonnello and Lal heard the noise, and a few hysterical giggled broke through Viper's clenched jaw when both the blonde and raven-haired girl froze, with their eyes popping open in panic.

Colonnello moved away from Lal's face, his hands still braced against the wall behind her as both he and Lal turned their heads to the source of the noise at the same time. Colonnello's mouth dropped open when he noticed their four friends in the doorway, showing various expressions of amusement. Reborn had this arrogant smirk slapped on his face that Lal, who was now _bright_ red, wanted to punch off.

"So what did Colonnello have for lunch today, Lalu?" Reborn asked. Even Luce allowed a giggle at that.

That was the last straw for Lal, and she attempted to jump from the desk with the intention to probably beat the shit out of Reborn. Colonnello put an arm around her waist and held her back, however, muttering something to her that the others couldn't hear. Whatever he had said caused the girl to relax and Colonnello let her feet touch the ground. He kept the arm around her waist, holding her against himself, just in case. Also because at this point there was no way to convince these four that they were drunk, and he liked to have Lal close to him.

Lal had a narrow-eyed stare trained on Reborn, and if he was honest it unnerved him a little bit.

"Who told you we were here?" Colonnello asked. Lal seemed unable to hold a conversation, and the redness in her face seemed less and less like embarrassment by the second.

"Reborn just told us he knew where you were," Fon said with a shrug, "I can say that I wasn't expecting this in the least." Viper nodded, still grinning and making Lal even angrier. Luce stepped forward, in front of the three boys and then said with that mom-voice of hers, "Okay, I think we've done enough damage. Time to go – your mom wants a picture with us all, I guess." She looked back and forth between the two groups of people with a calm smile, the look on her face daring any one of them to suggest otherwise.

Of course, no one dared raise a single word against the pleasantly smiling girl.

After about a million pictures, Lal finally escaped the torture of being squished between Reborn and Colonnello, both of them taking turns punching one another in the shoulder whenever there was a pause in pictures. Now she sat on the grass, leaning back against Colonnello's chest while eating a massive piece of corn on the cob, using his bent knees as arm rests.

Now that she wasn't bleeding murderous intent, it was actually nice to be able to be close to Colonnello as well as talk with her friends. She laughed as Skull attempted to toss up grapes and catch them in his mouth, and then threw a handful of salad at Reborn's face when he attempted to imitate her and Colonnello, from earlier on in the day.

The whole group whooped and hollered when Luce placed a kiss on Reborn's cheek, and it was Lal's turn to make fun of the blush that burned on his face. It was weird, realizing that this was really the last time that she would get to see her friends in this kind of playful, carefree atmosphere. In two weeks, she and Colonnello would be going to the West Point campus to begin the mandatory cadet training. The others would be preparing themselves for their futures, with the exception of Skull and Yuni. But everyone would be too busy moving forward to spend time like this again.

Colonnello broke Lal's depressing thoughts as he hugged her close to himself, leaning down to say something in her ear.

"I'm glad you went to prom." Lal looked a little surprised at the words, as they were unexpected and a little random. But she turned her head to kiss his cheek before smiling.

"Me too." Was all that she replied.

But that was enough.


End file.
